


Reunion of the Fallen

by nochick_fics



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist (Anime 2003)
Genre: Alternate Character Interpretation, Alternate Universe - Angels & Demons, Angel/Human Relationships, Fallen Angels, M/M, Past Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-30
Updated: 2017-05-30
Packaged: 2018-10-29 13:14:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 12
Words: 38,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10854747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nochick_fics/pseuds/nochick_fics
Summary: A group of Heaven's former finest gather on Earth one last time.





	1. Prologue 1-3

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is based on a comic and light novel set within the same angel-universe that I created forever ago. I wanted to see if I could incorporate elements of those stories into an FMA fanfic. There are some very specific themes within based on Christian theology... and lots of dude on dude stuff, too. :-)

**The Morning After**

Roy pried open his left eye and cast a blurred gaze upon the ceiling overhead, waiting for his right eye to follow suit. It was a wonder he was able to do even that much so soon after last night’s festivities, which had begun with an exorbitant amount of alcohol… which led into a frantic and almost downright brutal round of fucking… which then ended with even more alcohol. And then there was the smoking. Jean had polished off about a pack and a half of cigarettes in eight short hours and the room--already the seediest of motel dives in its own right--now reeked something fierce. Roy’s head was pounding from being hung-over, his lungs were all but clogged with secondhand smoke, and his ass was sore from being ravaged, but even so, the numbness within him remained. The indifference. The blatant disregard for anything outside of himself.  No amount of indulgences, no measure of self-imposed abuse could sway it--he just didn't give a damn.  As he hadn't for the past...

A frown lined his brow as he struggled to sit up, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed, burying his face in his hands and rubbing the sleep from his eyes. How many centuries _had_ it been now, confined to this waste of a planet, trapped in a rotting shell of flesh and at the mercy of the insufferably slow passage of human time, bearing reluctant witness to a world for which he couldn't have cared less?  
  
And how many more centuries still to come?

Roy rubbed at his temples in an effort to contain the headache that assaulted him. He winced bitterly as he got his first good taste of the horror that was the inside of his mouth and he cringed against the combined morning-after flavor of cheap alcohol, cheap food, and Jean’s cum. He reached over to the nearby nightstand and grabbed a warm, half-empty bottle of beer, taking a quick swig to wash some of the wretchedness down his throat. As he returned the bottle to the nightstand, he finally noticed the cigarette that Jean had left for him and his lips curved into a weak smirk. Jean always left him one after their nights together, and it was the only time Roy ever partook of the habit.

He plucked the cigarette from the stand and stared thoughtfully at it, all these years later still marveling at how such a tiny, seemingly insignificant thing could actually kill someone. It would have been funny in its irony if not so tragic. Not that he had any real sympathy for humans, because he most certainly did not--the selfish, ungrateful, disgusting little creatures that they were. But since _He_ seemed to care so damn much about them, Roy supposed it just couldn’t be avoided, to some extent. All of his kind, even the ones far from Home, bore remnants of the Father’s infinite affection for the stupid monkeys; it was a most unfortunate flaw that he was helpless to control.

Roy shoved the cigarette between his lips and glanced at the nightstand again, noticing that Jean hadn’t left him a lighter. But then again, it wasn’t as if he _had_ to.  He raised his right hand just out of reach of the tip of the cigarette, palm side up. A small, brilliant flame manifested on his fingers and he ducked his head carefully, lighting the cigarette and dragging deeply, letting the smoke saturate his body while he lazily twirled the summoned fire between his fingers. It didn’t burn; then again how could it? He was practically born of the stuff.

He closed his hand into a fist to extinguish the flame and lodged the cigarette between his first two fingers, peering down at the floor through the tendrils of smoke that embraced him. Oh, how he wanted to burn everything in his wake during moments like these, moments when his gifts were relegated to mere parlor tricks for the amusement of the others as they had been over the years, back to the days when the six of them still had something that remotely resembled a fellowship.  Of course, that was before the falling out that had forced them all to split up and go their separate ways. Archer and Kimblee, who were off doing... well... _God_ only knew what, Riza, vanishing without a trace during the night, and Maes...  
  
Maes.  
  
That fucking traitor.

With a slight shake of the head, Roy ground out the cigarette and stood up, allowing his body a moment to adjust to being upright. When walking felt like a viable option, he carefully made his way into the bathroom, flicking on the light and cursing its offensive brightness. He trudged over to the sink and took note of his haggard face and disheveled hair, wondering if it might not be a good idea to tone down his sessions with Jean. Even _his_ body, as divine as it was, needed a break from decades of hardcore pounding. What had begun as a drunken solution to boredom all those years ago had evolved into… well, Roy wasn’t exactly sure what was between them.  He only knew that it wasn’t love, not by a long shot. Since the beginning of time, he had only ever loved one, and it certainly wasn’t him.

He peeled off his shirt and tossed it aside, and the cool air of the bathroom hit him, causing goosebumps to surface on his smooth, pale skin. He always made it a point to keep the temperature in any of his dwellings as cold as possible; considering where he had been, it was only natural. He lowered his head and rolled it from side to side, ignoring the various creaks and cracks that sounded. Had he been born on this planet instead of confined to it, he supposed he would have been more concerned about the willful destruction of his body, but the fact of the matter was a very simple and irrefutable one: _he could not die._ At least, not until he was permitted to do so. He supposed the bigger question, the one that would eventually have to be answered someday, was where would he go when he finally did? It wasn’t as if either place would accept him with open arms when the time came, not after everything he had done. But… perhaps it was best not to think about that just yet.

Roy turned his back to the mirror and started the shower, stripping down to nothing as a breeze from the freezing stream of water wafted beneath the shower curtain and chilled him even more. He yawned loudly and stretched, much to the protest of his aching muscles, then ran a hand along the back of his neck, kneading the tight skin beneath it. His hand slipped lower, momentarily grazing one of two identical scars on either shoulder blade, each of them the jagged and torn reminder of his expulsion and lost glory--his _mark_ , in a manner of speaking--and he quickly pulled it away, clenching his teeth as a wave of revulsion filled him over the permanent reminder of his sins.

He eased into the shower and breathed a gusting sigh of relief as ice cold water drenched his body, soothing it from the outside in. As he did every morning upon waking, Roy found himself once again wondering if the day would bring about something different, something interesting, something new to break the painful and torturous routine that life on Earth had become.  The answer was always a resounding and disappointing negative, and he had no reason at all to believe that this day would be any exception.  But as it turned out, it would be.  
  
After this day, nothing would ever be the same again, for any of them.

* * *

**Planning Ahead**

After a final walk-through along the aisles of his new grocery store, meticulously inspecting each shelf to ensure that the items were stocked to capacity and facing forward, Maes retreated to the back and sat down at the large table that took up most of the room that would, starting tomorrow, serve as a break area for the handful of employees he had recruited for his most recent business endeavor. He decided to take advantage of the silence while it remained; twenty-four hours from now the room, as well as the store, would be booming with life, and quiet, at least during the hours of operation, would prove to be a precious commodity.

It was almost humorous, his foray into owning a grocery chain. On the surface, anyway. But, as with everything else in this wide and wonderful world to which he had become accustomed, there were reasons--reasons he eagerly accepted. Especially since those reasons brought him back to the town and, much more importantly, the _person_ he had never expected to see again.

His green eyes, sharp and stunning, moved along the walls until they spotted a series of framed photographs featuring an adorable little pig-tailed girl in a flower print dress. It was, in fact, the same dress that she was wearing now as she sat across from him, studiously bent over a coloring book and scribbling furiously with a blue crayon. Maes smiled to himself as he glanced at her handiwork, finding the whole thing rather ironic. But then again, where was it written that being from another plane of existence guaranteed that one could stay within the lines?

“Elysia,” he said slowly, navigating his way around the name that he himself had chosen for her. He would spend the rest of the day practicing it; if he was going to pass himself off to the humans as a doting father with the world’s most adorable little girl, he had better get her name right, at the very least.

Elysia stopped mangling the page and glanced up at him, her large eyes blinking patiently. It was almost a bit of a nuisance that the very act of talking would destroy the body she inhabited because he had yet to think of a suitable explanation for her muteness. But he would cross that bridge a little later.

“Do you like that name?” he asked.

The little girl smiled kindly and nodded before resuming her work, and Maes reached across the table and patted her on the head. Displays of affection were something else he would have to pretend to do naturally once they had an audience, no matter how strange and out of sorts it felt for him to do so. Even though human bodies were unbelievably fragile things, human _minds_ , on the other hand, were incredibly strong and intuitive. If anything, anything at all, seemed odd about his behavior, who knew what kind of unwanted attention it might attract?

Maes checked his watch and frowned. He had a lot of things to do before tomorrow, things he could ill afford to put off. But first, he just wanted to sit there a moment longer and enjoy the emptiness of the store. And in doing so, he found his mind once again wandering to the real purpose behind his return. True, there was the _official_ reason, but for Maes, the intent was much more personal… if a tad less noble.

He wanted to see Roy. He wanted to see him so badly that it hurt. Even if he could never set right the things that he had done to him, he wanted to try. And he wanted to tell him that he--

The blaring ring of a cell phone cut through the din of Maes’ thoughts. He reached into his pocket and pulled it out, frowning again at the number on the caller ID. It was time to get to work; the peace had come to an end.

And _in_ the end, how heartbreakingly prophetic those words would become.

*****

“Good morning, Brother!”

Ed cringed at the disgustingly happy-go-luckiness of Al's chipper morning salute. He moaned an unintelligible reply and plopped down at the kitchen table, stubbing his foot against it. Thankfully for him it was his left foot so he didn’t feel a thing.

Sometimes automail _did_ have its advantages.

“We’re out of eggs,” Al announced regretfully, pouring him a cup of coffee. “And I know you don’t like cereal.”

“No, I _love_ cereal,” Ed corrected him, rubbing at his eyes. “I just hate the goddamn milk.”

“Okay, one bowl of cereal, hold the goddamn milk, coming right up!” Al said, handing him his coffee and chuckling merrily.

Ed shook his head as he watched his brother forage through the cabinets for a clean bowl. It was entirely too early to be so fucking bouncy and had it been anyone else, the teen would have been highly tempted to chuck the cup of scalding liquid at them. But since it _wasn’t_ anyone else, he sighed in defeat and cursed the smile that crept onto his lips over Al’s dorky sweetness.

“That new store down the road is opening tomorrow,” he pointed out, blowing on the steaming brew. “I’ll stop by and get some eggs then. And who knows, maybe they’re giving away free stuff, too.”

“Maybe.” Al placed a large bowl in front of Ed and shoved a box of sugary sweet flakes in his direction. “Could you go ahead and grab some milk while you’re there?”

“Go to hell,” Ed muttered, sipping his coffee.

Al grinned and gave Ed’s ponytail a playful tug. “I’m off. See ya.”

“Later.” Ed watched Al bound out of the kitchen before taking another swig of coffee. He waited until he heard the slamming of the front door as the young teen headed off to school before breathing a large sigh of relief in the empty room. He loved his little brother, more than anything, but the solitude was quite nice, too. He and Al had practically been attached at the hip since they were children, so for Ed, it was a rare treat to openly indulge in certain activities that he often didn’t even feel safe doing in the privacy of his own bedroom when they were home together. Hell, he could spend the rest of the day walking around naked for all he cared. Not that he ever had, but if he wanted to…

He poured some cereal into the bowl and began eating it while he rummaged through yesterday’s newspaper, since today’s paper would most likely sit outside on the step as it almost always did until Al got home and brought it in, complete with a gentle admonition for letting it remain there the entire day. He came across a flyer for the new grocery store and made a mental note of a few other things he wanted to pick up while he was there--things which did _not_ include milk.

As Ed placed the flyer back in the pile, his eyes caught sight of the local entertainment section of the paper and he saw an ad for a bar. The only reason it even caught his attention today was that he realized it was only about three blocks away from the new store and less than a mile altogether away from where the brothers lived. He had, in fact, walked by there a few times on his rare ventures outside of the house. Glancing down at the corner of the ad, which itself was rather boring and uneventful, Ed noticed that it was one of the few places in town that permitted eighteen-year-olds, something he hadn’t noticed until just now.

He wasn’t a social person, not by a long shot. It was safe to say that if not for Al, Ed’s contact with the outside world would be wholly non-existent. But… maybe… it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to get out for an evening. It wasn’t as if the place would be crowded; every time Ed had ever passed it, it was virtually empty. So what the hell--he would go for it. And if, for some reason, the place was packed, he would simply turn around and hightail it home. It wasn’t as if he was going there because he _wanted_ to spend his hard-earned five bucks on a shot glass of Pepsi but conversely, he wasn’t ready to jump headlong into a large gathering of people, either. No, thank you.

And so with a goal now in place, Ed shoveled another handful of dry cereal into his mouth and chomped away, letting his thoughts settle on an online quiz he had to take at some point before tomorrow... one that would be the last thing on his mind by then.

*****

Roy leaned back against the headboard of the freshly made bed. He had almost felt bad for the poor cleaning lady and… No, that was a blatant lie. It was kind of funny, really, the look of horrified revulsion on her face at the amount of bodily fluid left on the sheets by Jean and himself because, yes, they had fucked _just that much._ He flipped blindly through the channels of the motel’s free cable and found himself thinking ahead to that evening’s plans. Right now, they were rather simple: eat pizza and avoid Jean.

And after that? Well, obviously alcohol did figure somewhere into the grand scheme, although he really was kind of tired of getting drunk in the room. But also he hated the bar scene with a passion; the absolute _last thing_ he wanted was to be surrounded by a bunch of drunk little monkeys.  Humans were annoying enough as it was. A _drunk_ human? Fucking unbearable. If he could just go somewhere that wouldn’t be crawling with people then maybe it would be alright…

After a moment, he thought of the perfect place.  Yep, that place would suit him just fine, as it turned out.

* * *

**Elysia**

The elaborate playground behind the quaint suburban dwelling that Maes Hughes called home would have been any child’s dream, complete with all the fixings that could keep a boy or girl busy for hours upon hours.

Elysia Hughes, however, was no ordinary child.

Who she _really_ was… well… it was much more complex than the sum of her human parts. Even so, she wasn’t above the simple pleasures that a girl her age would normally enjoy. Quite the contrary--she was rather fascinated with many aspects of childhood and all of the wonder that it entailed.

But her _true_ joys, those things that made her smile the most, were much more boring in a young one’s eyes: the calm whisper of a breeze, the sound of birds twittering, and the warmth of a sun that, at a glance, was so large and so bright… and yet so incredibly infinitesimal in the grand scheme of all the universes combined.

Her mind turned towards humans, funny litle creatures that they were. They honestly believed that they were at the center of it all. Elysia smiled to herself as she considered the sheer ridiculousness of their astounding hubris.  They truly had _no conception at all_ of just how collectively insignificant they were in the vast blueprint of creation and it never ceased to amaze her. But alas, she loved them all the same.

She pushed her body forward, causing the swing to move slowly back and forth, and she waved her sneakered feet frantically for more motion. It worked better when Maes pushed her, but he was inside, tending to whatever business he had to take care of before tomorrow's big day. She didn’t know about such things and she didn’t care; it didn’t concern her at all. Besides, she knew he didn’t particularly feel comfortable doing that or any of the other fatherly things he would have to do in the presence of others.  It was just plain silly in her opinion; she didn't _bite_ , for goodness sake.  But, given the circumstances, it was also completely understandable.

She already knew of his intentions to see Roy. Surely he knew that she did. It wasn’t something that she had purposely sought to find out but those things _did_ have a habit of coming to her. And she couldn’t blame him, really. After everything that had happened between those two… that Maes hadn’t done this sooner was a bit of a miracle. Elysia wished that she could say something to him about it; she wished she could just _say something_ in general, anything at all. The limitations of her body were, at times, most frustrating in that respect. But she _had_ tried in other ways to console him, although she knew there would be no true consolation until he could speak to Roy directly. This was something else she understood more than Maes would ever know.  He hadn't been the only one to feel the sting of that one's betrayal.  After almost splitting all of Heaven itself asunder with his pride and his arrogance and his audacity, with no regard whatsoever for anything other than his own skewed vision of right and wrong, Roy had most definitely betrayed her too. One could even say that he had betrayed _her_ most of all.

The swing came to a stop and Elysia wiggled her small feet as they dangled just above the ground. Her thoughts settled on the imminent future and all of the events to come, and she felt a small pang of trepidation settle around her heart. Things were going to move forward quickly now, speeding headlong towards an irreparable act of finality that would change the course of existence not only for the six Fallen and the one very special human who would both bind and break their union, but ultimately, everyone.  _Everywhere._  And while she wasn’t exactly helpless to stop it, interfering was--as the humans would say--against the rules. Elysia knew those rules rather well.   
  
She should; she practically wrote the book.  
  
She hopped off the swing and began a slow walk towards the back door, her wide, vibrant eyes taking in the clear blue sky overhead.  So beautiful... so calm....  It was a shame that it wasn't going to last.  
  
A storm was coming.  A very bad storm.  
  
And it would prove to be the greatest _parlor trick_ that the world had ever seen.


	2. An Angel Walks Into a Bar...

The place wasn’t a dive, but it sure had potential. 

Still, it was the kind of place Roy liked best: cheap and low-key.  The night was still fairly young, but even so, he didn’t think the struggling establishment would see much more in the way of business as it was seeing right now, with a whopping twenty to twenty-five people in attendance, including himself and the bartender.  How they managed to stay open was a mystery but he wasn’t about to complain.  Roy hated--he downright _despised_ \--being surrounded by too many humans, particularly the inebriated kind, so a bar like this was just about as close to perfection as he was going to get. 

He topped off a glass of Jack and took a long swig, wincing as it burned its way down his throat and lit his stomach.  He supposed he shouldn’t get too shitfaced tonight.  It wasn’t that he couldn’t handle himself around these primates; that part was a cinch.  But as it so happened, there were _more_ than just primates there tonight: there was another angel sitting at the bar, a few seats down from him.  And while Roy wasn’t necessarily a betting fellow, he was fairly positive that this one might be a bit of trouble.

There was no particular reason he could pinpoint for believing that, just a strong feeling that hit him the second the stranger had arrived, one that he couldn't ignore.  Even though he wasn’t as all-knowing as--

_Maes_

\--some, Roy still found himself occasionally bombarded by random flashes of insight, and while it was generally more of a nuisance than anything else, sometimes it was useful in its own way.

It wasn’t an uncommon occurrence, really, those who decided to make the journey there.  Angels descended from both Places all the time, coming to Earth to do whatever it was they came to do (which usually involved fucking a human at some point) until they had their fill and decided to return.  A few of them were castaways like Roy and the others, kicked out of Heaven or Hell for whatever grand offense had so slighted the Master of either realm.  But for the most part, they came voluntarily, which was something that he would never understand.  This planet was a shithole and its inhabitants were collectively worthless, and while it was true that Roy had stuck his own cock in more humans than he could remember over the centuries, whatever enjoyment he had gotten out of it wasn't anywhere _close_ to being worth the agony of transubstantiation. 

Fools, the whole lot of them.  Angels and humans alike.

Roy took another drink and absentmindedly tapped his foot to the tune filtering from the jukebox, a quaint little classic rock number that he actually kind of liked--a rarity, given his general disdain for the jarring auditory monstrosity that these people called music.  Just as he was contemplating fishing out a few quarters and making some musical selections of his own, a voice trailed over to him, low and conspiratory. 

“What’s your name?”

Roy glanced at the man and took in his considerable girth.  He was a solid man, comprised mostly muscle, and had a shit-eating smirk that Roy did not like in the least.  But he supposed he would make nice… for now.

“Roy Mustang,” he said, returning to his liquor. 

The man grinned and nodded in understanding.  He took a sip from the bottle of beer cradled in his hand and tried again.

“I meant your _real_ name.”

Of course he did; it wasn’t a question that their kind asked lightly.  However, his given name--his _true_ name--was not one he was eager to mention to _himself_ , let alone divulge to this stranger.  Roy wished, to some extent, that he could just forget it altogether for other reasons, as well… reasons that did nothing to further endear him to the human race, even if certain events couldn’t be blamed _wholly_ on them. 

Still, that name hadn’t touched his lips in the better part of two hundred years and it wasn’t about to on this night, either.

“Roy Mustang,” he repeated firmly.

His unwanted companion grinned and shrugged in defeat.  “Fair enough. Nice to meetcha, Roy Mustang.  I’m Dorochet.” 

Roy nodded and drummed his fingers against his glass, hoping like hell that this was not about to turn into a full-blown conversation.

“So, Roy Mustang--”

Apparently, it was.

“--how long have you been in town?”

_In town_ meaning on the planet.  And although an accurate answer was in no way damning to disclose, Roy still felt as if it was none of this guy’s business. He didn’t trust the looks of him, and that was cause enough.

“A little while,” he muttered. 

It was the truth.  Technically. 

Dorochet accepted this response with another hearty grin.  “I hear you,” he said, polishing off his beer and waving the bartender over for another one.  After receiving it, he slid off of his stool and welcomed himself to a seat next to Roy, who clenched his teeth in aggravation but said nothing. 

Again, for now.

“It's been about ten years for me,” the burly man said, settling in beside Roy. “Me and a couple of friends, we decided to see what all the goddamn hoopla was about, you know?”

“Yeah, I know.”

But no, Roy _didn’t_ know.  No one could have possibly ever given him enough to want to come to this place of his own free will. 

He kept his eyes trained on his glass and avoided the urge to peek at his watch while the man began to bombard him with tales of his worldly adventures, most of which revolved around all the sex he claimed to be getting.  He hadn’t planned on staying out all that long anyway, just long enough for Jean to give up the hunt and leave him be for the night.  But now was just as good a time as any to take off before this Dorochet fellow decided to make himself any more comfortable at Roy's expense than he had already become.

“… and my partner Greed looks at me and says, ‘Why not just fuck both of ‘em?’ And I said to myself, ‘Why the hell not?’ You know?”

Roy almost choked on his drink as Dorochet whacked him on the back amidst a round of bellowing laughter.  Aside from his disgust over the idea of this asshole balls-deep in _anything_ , Roy felt dull rage bloom in his chest and slowly seep throughout his body; he had to leave, and soon, before he set the entire bar ablaze in his agitation. 

“So we get these two chicks back to his place and… oh… now _that_ , my friend, is a fine-looking piece of ass.  A little short, but still mighty fine.”

Because he hadn’t been paying full attention to the incessant rambling, Roy almost missed Dorochet’s sudden proclamation.  He followed the man’s deplorable ogling, fully steeling himself to behold some resident bar skank… and instead found himself gazing at a kid in a red coat who was handing the bartender two empty glasses.  Well, he was at least eighteen being that he was in the bar in the first place, but Roy didn’t think there was any way possible he was much older than that.  It was little wonder he hadn’t noticed him when he first came in; the kid really _was_ short--the damn booth would have practically swallowed him.  And that he had just cleared his own table was a sure sign of a bar virgin.  How cute.

Roy felt the corner of his mouth twitch and a frown immediately etched itself into his face. 

Did he… did he almost _smile?_

Where the hell had _that_ come from?

“Well, Roy Mustang,” Dorochet said, setting down his bottle and hauling his mass out of the seat.  “It was nice chattin’ with ya but I think I just found my company for the evening.”

Although the prospect of getting rid of his presence was appealing, Roy knew where this was going. 

“Isn’t that up to him?” he asked, subtly raising an eyebrow. 

Dorochet chortled at the query and gave him a parting pat on the shoulder before following the teen out of the bar. Roy stared at the man’s wide back as he exited the room and turned back to his drink. 

It was none of his business, after all. 

None whatsoever.

Nope.

“Goddammit.”

He slammed his glass on the countertop and stood up, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a wad of cash.  After throwing a few bills next to the half-empty bottle of alcohol, Roy headed outside, cursing himself under his breath and wondering just what in the hell a kid like that was thinking, going to a bar by himself...

*****

_What the hell was I thinking?_

Ed tried not to consider the fact that he had somehow allowed himself to be cornered at the side of the bar by the big, bumbling oaf in front of him.  He had been so wrapped up in his own thoughts--thoughts consisting primarily of questioning why he had even bothered leaving the house in the first place--that he found himself completely caught off guard by this guy, who called himself… Doorshay was it?  Dorochet.  Whatever.  It hardly mattered.

And now he was stuck.  Everything was still alright, though; no harm was done.  All he had to do was politely hear him out, turn him down, and excuse himself so that he could go home to Al (and _food_ , because damned if he was about to pay ten bucks for eight fucking chicken wings!) and settle in for the night.  But first…

“So what do you say?” the man asked, flashing a wolf-like smile.  “I don’t live too far from here.  I’ll even buy you some beer, or whatever you want to drink.”

Ed remembered to try his best to sound sympathetic.  “I’d love to,” he started, ranking that statement among one of the biggest lies he had ever told in his young life.  “But I really have to get home to my little brother.”

“Oh, come on,” Dorochet said. “Just for a little while.” 

Before he could touch Ed with his grubby fingers, he was seized in a strong, vise-like grip.  His eyes flew open in shock as his wrist cracked under the enormous pressure of an automail hand, exerting a power that was simply unfathomable coming from such a tiny human being. 

“You little fucker!  _Let go of me!_ ”

Ed released him and, unaware he was even doing so, wiped his gloved hand on his coat as if trying to remove something foul.  “I'm sorry.  It’s just that… I… I don’t like… being touched… a lot,” the teen explained, hoping he sounded at least marginally sincere.  It was the least he could do; the man’s wrist was at the very least sprained. Ed didn’t have to have feeling in his right hand to know the unmistakable sound of crumbling bone. “I’m sorry if I hurt you.” 

“Boy,” Dorochet whispered, leaning in close and glaring at Ed with murder in his eyes.  “I think you need to learn what ‘hurt’ really is.”

There was something… something _bad_ behind those eyes, causing doubt and fear to run through Ed like vines up a wall.  The lighting outside was dim and the sidewalk and street were eerily silent--he was all alone.  If he couldn’t strong-arm his way out of this, he was fucked… and no, he most certainly did _not_ want to consider the ways in which he would be. 

_“Dorochet.”_

Both Ed and his captor turned towards the voice.  Another man rounded the corner and approached them slowly, his hands jammed deep into his pockets and his serene gaze dancing over Ed’s face before settling upon Dorochet, and even in the urgency of his present dilemma, Ed could not help but notice that he was… absolutely  _breathtaking._

“Hello again, Roy Mustang.  Decided to join me?” Dorochet asked, taking a step away from Ed.  
  
Ed was vaguely aware that it might have been a wise idea to use the distraction as an opportunity to run away.  Then again he was vaguely aware of _a lot_ of things that suddenly seemed far away and unimportant.

“I think the boy would like to go home,” the man said, narrowing his eyes into slits.  He glanced at Ed--

_Stupid boy.  Why aren’t you running away?_

\--before turning his attention once again to Dorochet.

While the conversation carried on without him, Ed gaped at the stranger.  His mind was still reeling from the violation of this Roy Mustang's voice, trying to process the improbable.

No, not the improbable.  The _impossible._

_What the hell is going on?_

“Yeah, well, tough shit,” Dorochet continued, holding up his arm and showing Roy the way his hand flopped lifelessly about. “This little asshole just broke my wrist.  He owes me _something_.”

Roy inspected Ed’s handiwork with a mixed expression of curiosity and humor.  “Fine,” he said.  “How about I give you that ‘something’ in exchange for leaving him alone?”

Dorochet froze, taken aback by Roy’s sudden proposition.  “You serious?”  His greedy eyes crawled over Roy’s body while he considered the proposal.  “I mean, I’ve only ever fucked humans but hell, I’m game if you mean it.”

Ed finally snapped out of his shock as the odd statement hit his ears and penetrated the fog of his mind, and his wide golden eyes flitted between both men for clarification.

“… Wh-What do you mean, humans?”

*****

Right then and there, Roy decided that the next time he wanted a drink, he would stay in.  Period. 

He closed his eyes and shook his head.  This was the _last_ thing he needed.  All he had meant to do was buy the stupid boy enough time to get the hell out of there and instead he now found himself faced with the big reveal, all on account of a fucking idiot. 

Goddammit, indeed.

“He means that _he_ , being an angel, has never fucked another angel, like  _me_ ,” Roy explained, easing past Dorochet and standing directly in front of the teen.  “You see, he’s only ever fucked human beings.  Like  _you_.” 

He stared down into the boy’s face and watched the battle between belief and disbelief play out with concealed amusement. Any other time, he would have been able to sit back and revel in witnessing a human mind bend as it tried to wrap itself around the greater truth. Some of them, taught to believe their entire _lives,_  were still reduced to babbling and incoherence when faced with irrefutable evidence of the Divine. 

Unfortunately, now was not the time to enjoy the show.

“Whoa, hold on now,” Dorochet said, his voice ripe with hesitation. “Hey, Roy. I know I slipped up, but are you sure you want to go telling him all of that?”

“It doesn’t matter. He won’t remember a thing,” Roy said, smiling warmly at the young man.  “Will you… Edward?”

“H-How did you know…?”

Ed suddenly fell forward, collapsing against Roy’s chest and catching him off guard; he was a lot heavier than he looked, for some reason.  Roy wrapped an arm around his waist and caught a faint whiff of some sort of fruit-scented shampoo emanating from his long blond hair.  It smelled rather nice.  He eased the teen down to the ground, gently securing his head so that it wouldn’t loll about and strike something. The kid was going to have enough of a headache when he finally woke up and a concussion was the last thing he needed. 

“So… are we doing this or what?” Dorochet asked impatiently.

Roy stood upright and turned around, smiling again.  There was nothing warm about it this time.

“Yes.  Let's  _do this,_ ” he said, stretching out his hand...

*****

As the last vestiges of awareness slipped away from Ed--who thought he was, in fact, _dying_ \--he made a very startling discovery, one he would regrettably cease to recall upon waking.

That wasn’t a light at the end of the tunnel of his waning consciousness.

It was _fire_.  
  
*****  
  
Twenty minutes later, swathed in the overpowering stench of smoke and charred flesh, Roy bent down and scooped the small body into his arms.  As he stood up, he immediately felt the reason why the boy had seemed to weigh more than he looked like he should have, by way of the heavy metal arm and leg that rested against him.  
  
_Metal, huh?  Interesting._  
  
He peered briefly over his shoulder at the unidentifiable lump smoldering against the wall of the bar.  
  
_Everything_ happened for a reason.  There was no such thing as coincidence.   
  
Roy looked at the dozing teen in his arms and sighed softly.  
  
"I think you're going to be the _real_ trouble, kid."


	3. Impending Doom

_Voices._

_(—can’t believe you did this!)_

_I hear voices._

_(—none of your business.)_

_Are they talking about… me?_

_(Roy, you have no idea what—)_

_Roy? I know that name. I think._

_(—if that happens.)_

_What’s… going… on…?_

Ed slipped back into the depths of unconsciousness.

Another two hours would pass before he awakened.

*****

Riza Hawkeye felt a bitter smirk spread across her face as she stared at the darkened storefront. Although Maes was the only one of them she hadn’t bothered keeping tabs on over the years, somehow she wasn’t surprised at all that he would partake of an endeavor such as this; it was, in many ways, just like him. Well, if nothing else, maybe she could score some free shit from him while she was there. That was the _least_  he could do.

Fifty years had passed now, give or take, yet for Riza, being there with the others so close in proximity made the passage of decades feel like little more than weeks. Truthfully, she could have easily gone another fifty years without returning. It was nothing personal… no, that was a blatant lie.

They had all made what little peace they could with their confinement amongst the humans and dispersed to live out the remainder of their penance in whatever way suited them. Maes, apparently going into business for himself, and an interesting choice for one, at that; Archer and Kimblee, like so many other angels, getting caught up in a sway of hedonism so obscene it was shameful, even by human standards; and Roy and Jean… together…

Riza’s jaw clenched tightly as she slipped her hand into her purse. What those two were doing… would do…  _had done_ … none of that concerned her, although there  _was_  something to be said for her long overdue acknowledgment of the jealousy that had caused her to flee in the first place. How many years had she spent wondering why Roy succeeded where she had failed? Surely it wasn’t just a matter of the flesh. Gender was completely irrelevant to their kind; hell, it didn’t even  _exist_ in their world.

So why Roy? Was it because he had been—up until his unceremonious departure from Grace—so revered in the Father’s eyes? Was it a badge of honor for Jean to say that he had wooed and inevitably fucked the greatest angel in Heaven?

Was it  _love?_

She shook her head in an effort to clear her mind of that  _highly_  unlikely probability. None of her speculation changed the fact that Jean had made his choice, and that choice was not her.

Riza kept her eyes trained on the storefront as she wrapped a slender hand around the butt of the Desert Eagle hidden snugly inside of the handbag. It wasn’t her favorite piece by any stretch of the imagination, not when she had managed to amass one of  _the_  most extensive collections of weaponry ever assembled in human history, at least in terms of raw killing power. What could she say? She liked guns.

Granted, she did very little in the way of killing, but a bullet to the cranium of any angel— while actually far from deadly—was guaranteed to be _very_  painful. Not to mention _very_  messy.

She rested her finger against the trigger of the handgun as the stranger ambled towards her, mentally calculating the odds of whether or not she might have to use it. Not that every angel she ran across was worthy of a bullet to the dome, but she did believe in being prepared—

“Riza? Is that  _you?_ ”

Riza turned toward the sound of the voice and gazed at its owner, shocked that apparently so much time had passed that she hadn’t immediately sensed it was him… and happier than she would have ever dared to admit to herself, let alone out loud. She discreetly pulled her hand out of her purse… but only after a moment of consideration.

She was still feeling a bit scorned, after all.

“Hello, Jean.”

Jean Havoc grinned as he approached Riza and swept her into a crushing embrace, momentarily picking her up off the ground in doing so. He set her down and smiled warmly at her, and it was all she could do to keep herself from returning it. For what little it was ultimately worth, the body he inhabited was… mighty fine.

“Holy shit. I can’t believe I’m looking at you,” Jean marveled. “Welcome back.”

“I’m not  _back_ ,” Riza corrected with a brisk shake of the head. “I’m just passing through.”

Jean raised an eyebrow in suspicion. “Oh yeah? I believe that as much as I believe this,” he countered, gesturing towards the store.

“What does… what does Roy have to say about it?” Riza found it almost amusing, this fucking angelic soap opera millennia in the making. Almost amusing, if not so tragically accurate.

A small frown passed over Jean’s face at the mention of Roy’s name, which she found odd but chose not to question. Besides, whatever lovers’ squabble they were having was none of her business.

“I think he’s a bit too… preoccupied to even realize it yet,” Jean pointed out. “But I can’t imagine he’ll be very happy about it.”

Riza nodded solemnly. “And I suppose we can’t just pass any of this off as coincidence, can we?”

“No such thing, my dear.” Jean reached into his pocket and pulled out a battered soft pack of cigarettes. He jammed one into the corner of his mouth and lit it, dragging deeply.

“What about Archer and Kimblee?” Riza asked. “Have you seen them yet?”

Jean shook his head and exhaled a long steam of smoke. “No. But I imagine we will soon enough.”

“What  _the hell_  is going on, Jean?”

Jean smoked silently as he considered her question.

After a moment, he finally answered.

“I’m not  _exactly_  sure… but I think I might have an idea.”

*****

“Hey, Archer. I think we broke that one.”

“That one” being the cum-drenched, off-shift bellhop who was currently sprawled out across the king sized bed of their posh hotel room, recovering from the massive and  _repeated_ ravaging of his mouth and ass, a hell of a tip indeed. A rare and special exception had been made just for him; his hosts had specifically waited until his work day was over to entertain him, otherwise the room would have long since erupted into all out debauchery from the very moment they checked in.

Surely it had nothing to do with the fact that the man bore a striking resemblance to their old friend Roy, or so they insisted.

Zolf Kimblee’s melodic and slightly psychotic chuckle echoed throughout the bathroom as he stood in the walk-in shower and let a spray of warm water splash against his chest. He quickly dunked his head under the stream, just enough to dampen his long hair. He then grabbed a nearby bottle of complimentary shampoo and held it up over his shoulder.

“I think you’re right,” Frank Archer agreed, taking the shampoo from him and squeezing a generous amount onto his palm before handing it back to him. “I suppose we shouldn’t kick him out until he can walk,” he added, running his fingers through Kimblee’s locks and working up a lather.

“Such the humanitarian, you are,” Kimblee quipped, closing his eyes and tilting back his head, moaning softly while Archer massaged his scalp. He shuddered as a chill surged up his spine over the fingers that were dancing through his hair… and the cock that was digging into his back. Truth be told, he could have gone another two or three times, but when it became apparent that their guest could no longer handle the rampant sucking or fucking, they reluctantly decided to show him some pity. For now.

It was one of the disadvantages of screwing humans, unfortunately. Kimblee had wanted very much to fuck this particular one until sometime around dawn, but it appeared as if that was not going to be the case. At least, not this night. Because aside from their guest’s inability to keep up with their ravenous libidos, there was that other pesky little issue at hand, the one that had brought them into town in the first place.

“So what do you think?” Frank asked. Although his pale face and cold blue eyes would never show the true depth of his occasional sincerity, he spoke with an edge of thoughtfulness, one reserved only for Kimblee.

“I don’t know,” Kimblee replied, lowering his head under the shower head to rinse his hair.

And that was that. Up until that moment, neither of them had mentioned their impromptu journey upon the realization that it was not so impromptu. There really wasn’t much to be said; there was only the undeniable sense of foreboding that had overcome both of them. Obviously that hadn’t stopped them from indulging in their usual activities, but it was still there, lingering in the air around them like a fog. However, it was best not to dwell too long on such things; they usually had a way of making themselves known when the time was right. Until then, all they could do was—

“Fuck me,” Kimblee ordered, reaching behind his back and grabbing onto to Archer’s cock.

Archer, who had been wringing the excess water from Kimblee’s hair, groaned as he was being stroked. Then, using the same hands that had so tenderly massaged his lover’s scalp, he tightened his hold around the damp locks and swung Kimblee around, slamming him hard into the shower wall. He planted a surprisingly chaste kiss on the other man’s temple before clamping down hard on his shoulder and thrusting his hips forward. Kimblee hissed and arched backwards, rubbing his ass against Archer’s cock as his own slid along the wall in front of him…

And so their wait had begun. In the best possible way.

*****

Greed found her out on the back porch, sitting in a chair with a bottle of Jim Beam nestled firmly between her thighs.

It was a damn good look.

“Hey. You alright?”

Martel glared up at him through fierce eyes. This, he thought, was a damn good look as well and he was hard pressed to remember exactly  _why_  they hadn’t fucked yet.

“I can’t go back in there,” she said. “That goddamn smell…” Martel took a healthy swig of Beam before shoving the bottle back between her legs. “I can’t fucking take it, Greed. This fucking meat suit smells so disgusting when it’s not…  _living_ ,” she added, gesturing at her body.

“Just try to bear with it, babe. Loa will be here soon,” Greed said. He sat down beside her and plucked the whiskey from between her legs, trying—and failing—to keep from contemplating all of the things that could be done between two people involving bottles and such. “You know we couldn’t just leave him back there.”

After taking a drink, he handed the bottle back to her. Martel took another deep chug and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “A human didn’t do that.”

Greed shook his head slowly and settled back into his seat, stretching out his legs. “Nope,” he said. “A human  _couldn’t_ have done that. Hell, there’s only one  _angel_  who could have… and if I’m right, then it looks like we’re about to go to war with the number one son himself. Before the J-boy came along, that is.”

Martel, who had been mid-swallow upon Greed’s revelation, sputtered and hacked loudly into the palm of her hand. She gaped at him in horror, and he fancied a wide array of things she could do with such a perfect O of a mouth.

_“What?”_

Greed chuckled and snatched the bottle from her. “You silly fucking kids. No wonder Dorochet went and got himself killed.” He took yet another drink before continuing. “Eh, it’s not really your fault, I guess. You haven’t been around nearly as long as I have and the history’s a bit… twisted. Plus it’s not like the Big Bad himself is itching to set the record straight.”

“Greed, I… I don’t…”

“You know how these stupid people have that saying… how does it go? ‘The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world that he didn’t exist’ or something like that. But actually, the  _real_ trick was convincing them that he was  _someone else_.” Greed rose to his feet and gazed down at the confused woman. “Here, suck on this,” he offered, handing her the bottle. “Stay out here until I come get you,” he added in an uncommon show of sympathy as he walked over to the back door.

He stepped into the house and shut the door behind him, wincing and swallowing hard as the smell of charred flesh hit his nose. Martel was right; it was fucking  _disgusting_. If not for these silly little secular laws about finding corpses in back alleys, Greed would have left him there without hesitation. Dorochet was gone now; there was no point in fawning over that burnt shell as if it had anything to do with the one who had occupied it. If nothing else, the one thing that  _all_ angels generally agreed on was the silliness of the humans’ reactions to their dead. Preserving them so that they rotted prettily underground or, stranger still, reducing them to dust and putting them on display. Total and utter weirdness.

Greed entered the living room and begun pacing around as he waited for Loa to arrive. Dorochet’s remains rested on a floor in the corner—Greed hadn’t wanted to risk leaving him anywhere outside. He was glad he’d had the foresight to rent a house as opposed to an apartment; it would have been a bit difficult having to explain why he was dragging a body through a building. Those humans were a damn nosy lot, yes they were.

Now if only he’d had the foresight to know that the stupid bastard would go and put himself into a situation where he was going to face off against…  _him_ ….

Greed sighed deeply and ran his fingers through his hair as he considered the monumental task he was about to undertake. Not disposing of Dorochet, that part was easy. Taking on the Six? Not so much. Of course, he could just let it go. He could just walk away and leave it all alone. They could just pack up and leave town and be done with all of it. But… no. No, no, no. Someone had been stolen from him. Someone who had been a right pain in the ass on numerous occasions, but even so, a friend. Therefore it was only right, only  _just_ , that he return the favor.

He just needed to figure out a way how…

“Perhaps I can help you with that.”

Greed turned towards the sound of the voice.

“Loa, it’s about fucking— _who the fuck are you?”_

A hearty, good-natured chortle filled the room. Greed spotted a suave, middle-aged man standing beside Dorochet’s body, smiling warmly at his shocked face. He vaguely thought that the eye patch seemed a bit out of place amidst such a well-tailored appearance, but he was entirely too taken aback to pay it much mind.

“I’m no one important,” the man insisted. “What  _is_  important is how I can help you achieve your objective.”

The debonair stranger casually stepped over Dorochet and approached Greed. He placed a hand on his shoulder and leaned forward, lowering his voice as if not to divulge some great and wonderful secret to anyone other than its intended recipient.

“You see, Greed,” he said. “Instead of attacking them head-on and winding up as dead as Dorochet over there, what you want to do first is find a boy who goes by the name of—”

*****

“Edward.”

Ed slowly opened his eyes and blinked up at a ceiling that he did not recognize. He sat up and clapped a hand to his head as a bolt of pain tore through it.

“Where the hell am I?” His amber eyes happened upon his host. “Who the hell are you? And how the hell do you know my name?”

The man smiled at him, his eyes glowing with amusement over the teen’s colorful method of questioning. “My name is Roy,” he said, offering him a bottle of water. “A couple of hours ago, you passed out at the bar and I brought you back to my motel room. I know your name because I found your identification in your wallet.”

Ed took the water and frowned as he racked his brain for the slightest recollection of his lost time. “Passed out? But… I don’t… I don’t drink… I  _can’t_ drink. I’m not old enough.”

“Well, apparently the bartender thought otherwise.” Roy stood up and walked across the room. He grabbed a pizza box from the dresser and held it out. “Hungry?”

The teen’s stomach gurgled loudly before he could politely decline. “Thanks. Oh yeah, their food… it was fucking expensive.”

“Yeah,” Roy agreed. “Kind of surprising, considering their alcohol is so cheap. Here you go,” he said, placing the box on the bed beside Ed. “I’m sorry it’s cold.”

“No problem,” Ed reassured him, digging in.

Roy helped himself to a slice as the teen hungrily inhaled the rest of it, the silence between them broken only by the sound of Ed’s ravenous chewing.

“So you live here?” he finally asked, gnawing on the crust of the last slice.

“Yes.” Roy perused the room. “I move around quite a bit, so it’s best not to put the effort into committing to any one place.”

“Doesn’t sound cheap.”

Roy nodded in agreement. “It’s not. But I make do.”

Ed was about to ask the man what he did for a living but realized that it would probably fall under things one doesn’t inquire about upon waking up in a stranger’s bed. He was surprised that he felt at ease enough to say much of anything at  _all,_  especially since he normally had such a hard time around anyone except for Al. But there was just something about this guy, something he couldn’t quite put his finger on.

Something almost… familiar?

“Thanks again,” he said, closing the empty box. “I can pay you for it.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Roy insisted. “Are you feeling better now?”

“Yeah.” With his stomach now full, Ed was stunned to find that his headache was completely gone. “I feel fine.”

Roy smiled at him again. “Good,” he said, taking the empty box over to a garbage can and cramming it in as best he could.

Ed let his eyes trail down the older man’s body before turning away quickly, feeling a blush rise in his face for checking out the rather  _spectacular_  ass of a stranger. He dug his feet into the carpet and only then did he realize that they were bare, his boots and socks sitting neatly by the door of the room. That meant that Roy had seen…

“I should go now,” he said suddenly, standing up and going over to the door. “My brother’s probably wondering where I am.”

He quickly threw on his left sock and boot, as if doing so would somehow negate the entire time his automail had been exposed.

“Would you like a cab?” Roy asked, watching the teen hop clumsily about.

“No, thanks. I like to walk.” Ed stopped his one-footed dance long enough to offer Roy a shy smile. “Thank you… for… taking care of me.”

“You’re welcome, Edward.”

“… Ed.”

“You’re welcome,  _Ed_ ,” Roy amended.

Ed slipped on his right sock and boot and grabbed onto the door handle. “Well… um… it was… nice meeting you… Roy.”

Roy walked over to the door and wrapped his hand around Ed’s. The teen gasped as he felt the man’s warm hand on top of his, sending a shiver along every inch of his skin. And even though he normally  _hated_  being touched by anyone, fuck if he wasn’t getting half a hard-on just from that.

_What the hell?_

“Be careful going home,” Roy said, squeezing Ed’s hand as he opened the door. He pulled away and stood back, granting the teen a clear path outside.

“Y-Yeah, I will.”

Ed slipped out of the door and walked away without looking back, half hoping that Roy would call out for him and absolutely terrified that he might. But instead of hearing his name, his ears were met with the sound of a closing door and a chain lock.

Well then. That settled that.

He had wanted to say more. And… he had wanted to…  _do_ more. When would he ever wake up in the bed of some hot guy again? But between his automail revelation and his impending erection, Ed had been entirely too embarrassed to do anything other than leave, squandering an opportunity he did not anticipate receiving again anytime soon.

He headed out to the sidewalk and stopped, taking in his surroundings so that he could figure out where in the hell he was. After figuring it out and calculating that he would be walking through his front door in about thirty to forty minutes, Ed shoved his hands into his pockets and set off, replaying the scene in his head over and over again and pondering whether or not he would be lucky enough to see that beautiful stranger again…

*****

Roy stood by the closed door for quite some time.

_Roy, you have no idea what you’ve done._

Although he had initially dismissed Jean’s earlier rant as jealousy, there had been an underlying hint of truth in everything that the man had said. Everything except for that one particular statement.

Roy knew  _exactly_  what he had done. He just didn’t know  _why_  he had done it.

Or what it would cost him.

*****

Maes slipped into the little girl’s bedroom and crept over to her bed. Through the faint glow of a Cabbage Patch Kids nightlight he could see her curled into a ball and sleeping soundly, tightly clutching a large white teddy bear. It was, admittedly, a rather precious sight.

He took a seat by the edge of the bed and closed his eyes, letting the darkness and quiet consume him. His heart was troubled, more than he wanted to acknowledge, and the simple act of sitting there helped. Somewhat. It had started earlier that night, the feeling of discomfort that just wouldn’t go away no matter how hard he tried to fight it. It wasn’t a physical pain, although he wished like hell it had been.

No, this was something different. Something deeper. Something the humans called… what was it? Ah, yes:

_Impending doom._

Maes opened his eyes when he felt a tiny hand on top of his head. He turned to see Elysia watching him closely, her wide eyes full of a knowledge no little girl her age could possibly begin to fathom.

“Sorry. I couldn’t sleep,” he explained, giving her a lopsided smile.

Elysia smiled back and gave him a loving pat before sitting up in the bed. She placed the teddy bear beside her and folded her hands and legs neatly as she continued regarding him with the same sweet yet knowing gaze.

Maes stared down at the floor, debating what to say. Kind of silly, really, considering the company.

“You… you already know about my intentions with Roy,” he said. “I don’t want you to think that I regret the choice I made because I don’t,” he insisted. “Not at all. I just… I need to make him understand.”

He finally brought himself to look at her again.

“Do you understand that?”

Elysia nodded and Maes was glad for that… but the trepidation surrounding his heart remained and he was at a loss to explain it.

Something else was wrong.

He closed his eyes again and reached into the depths of his insight. He saw Archer… and Kimblee… and Riza… and Jean… and… the face of a boy he did not know… and Roy.

Roy was…

_Impending doom._

Maes’ eyes flew open. He sat up on his knees, facing the bed, and looked up at the little girl with panic in his green eyes.

“Father? Is Roy in trouble?”

He found his answer in her downcast face, which was so wrought with sadness that Maes could find no hope in it. None whatsoever.

*****

Elysia could feel the pain emanating from him in waves and her heart ached in its helplessness, not only for Roy, not only for Maes, but for  _all_ of them. She scooted forward and held him in a small but powerful embrace, blinking against the sting of tears. This particular Incarnation was, by far, the one most prone to physical expressions of emotion. But she _couldn’t_  cry, as much as she wanted to; an uncontrolled crying or laughing spell would prove just as fatal for her as talking. It wasn’t so much a flaw in the human makeup as it was a mere oversight; in retrospect, He had simply never anticipated inhabiting the very thing that He created.

So much for omniscience.

As she had done so many times since the beginning, Elysia comforted Maes as best she could while she considered the decision that he would yet again be forced to make between the two most important beings in his existence. When the moment came, would he choose the Throne once more? Or would his guilt over forsaking Roy the first time lead him down a much different—and far darker—path the next?

She already knew the answer, of course.

Now all she could do was wait until it came to pass.


	4. Hands of God

Thus far, the day had gone as smoothly as Maes hoped it would.  People had been flocking through the doors in droves since the place first opened that morning to get a gander at the new store in town.  Of course, the various door prizes and other random incentives didn’t hurt either; anything was more appealing when the word ‘free’ was somehow involved.  
  
Because he had selected a surprisingly efficient store manager, Maes ended up having to do very little himself aside from making the obligatory rounds and answering the occasional question.  And as he had suspected might happen, Elysia immediately became the center of attention whenever she was with him.  Women particularly, regardless of their age, thought that she was—as they said—as cute as a button.  Although Maes didn’t really understand how buttons were supposed to be cute, he dutifully smiled and agreed each and every time the strange phrase came up.  The little girl had garnered the expected sympathy because of the “accident” that had rendered her mute and Maes found himself receiving tons of unsolicited advice regarding Elysia’s detriment, from the names and numbers of so-called specialists to offers of sign language instruction.  He thought it peculiar how such nosiness begat helpfulness; these humans really would never cease to humor and amaze him. 

Now, with only a few hours left before closing and Elysia safely tucked away in the back room with her coloring books, far removed from the prodding and ooohing and ahhhing, Maes strolled the aisles yet again.  His face was becoming rather sore from all of the damn smiling he’d had to do. Not that he minded, but it was a bit tiresome having to be  _on_  all the time. He stumbled upon the feminine hygiene row—

_Way to go, Eve._

—and briskly made his way past a group of ladies discussing various maxi-pad attributes.  Even though he wasn’t human, he had still been a “man” long enough to find it awkward… which the ladies who had been discussing said attributes found delightfully humorous as they saw him practically scamper by them. He quickly rounded the corner, blissfully spared from any further tampon talk and infinitely grateful that the Father hadn’t decided to inhabit an older female body because that would have been very awkward.

Maes stopped suddenly and just barely managed to avoid being bowled over by a shopping cart manned by an elderly woman who looked as if she had no business whatsoever operating anything with wheels.    
  
Roy was there, somewhere just beyond those doors.

It was a strange and wonderful thing, Maes thought, how the passage of eons upon eons hadn’t changed the surge of magnetism that manifested whenever they were in close proximity to each other, drawing them together almost as if they were made precisely for one another.  In many ways and for all he knew, perhaps they  _were_ , being that he and Roy had been the first of the First and the left and right Hand of God, respectively.  Not that such things mattered anymore.  No, too much time had passed and too many things had gone so terribly wrong.  All Maes could hope to do now was try to make him understand why he had done what he had done.   

In spite of the garbled forewarning of his insight… in spite of all the horror to come… at that moment, it was the  _only_  thing that mattered.

*****

Roy wasn’t sure how long he had been standing there, watching, waiting, wondering if he should even bother going inside… as if it was even a matter up for debate. 

Maes was there, somewhere just beyond those doors.

Even after all of this time, the connection between them whenever they were near each other was as overwhelming as ever, almost as if it was by design.  Roy supposed it was only natural, seeing as how they had been together from the very beginning, since before existence even existed.  Although the concept of soulmates was merely a human fabrication, developed by romantic fools who clung to the ridiculous notion that there was one, and  _only_  one, perfect spirit out there just for them, in their case, such a thing was not a far-fetched notion. 

Roy supposed that he couldn’t postpone the inevitable any longer.  Well, he could, but it would be pointless to do so. He let out a deep, gusting sigh and slowly stepped inside the store.

*****

Later, Maes would look back on the moment and smile to himself as he compared it to something out of a cheesy Harlequin novel.  But for now, nothing of the sort crossed his mind when they spotted each other across the throng of shoppers.  It was simply… as it should be. 

In spite of all the time that had passed since their last confrontation, Maes found him to be as stunning as ever.  In the farthest reaches of Heaven or Hell or Earth, whether as an angel or as a human, Roy had always been  _the_ most captivating entity that he had ever known; nothing would ever change that. 

Maes beckoned to him with a slight nod of the head and turned around, making his way through the crowd towards the back room…

*****

… which was empty, save for a little girl sitting at a table, studiously bent over a coloring book and scribbling frantically.

Except she  _wasn’t_ just a little girl. Roy could sense something different about her right away, something hidden, something almost… familiar.  It was none of his business, though; if Maes had decided to adopt a companion then that had nothing to do with him. 

Roy followed him through the room and into an adjoining private office, mindful to keep his eyes trained anywhere that wasn’t Maes’ tall, undeniably attractive human form—he hadn’t come there to ogle him, as tempting as it was. He clenched his teeth as the smell of cologne wafted back to him, cursing himself for liking it. 

Without being asked, he took a seat in front of the desk and craned his head to and fro, taking in the sights of his surroundings.  Among the stacks of papers and folders blanketing the desk, there were also pictures of Maes with that same little girl, not just there but on the walls as well.  Apparently he had decided to build himself up as a doting dad for some reason; perhaps he felt it was good for business?  Again, though, it was none of his concern. If Maes wanted to masquerade as Father of the Year, Roy couldn't have cared less.

Maes closed and locked the door before rounding the desk and sitting down. He opened the bottom drawer and pulled out a bottle of whiskey and two small glasses.  Roy was impressed in spite of himself; he had assumed that Maes would have long since given up such devious secular activities. He let his eyes trail along Maes’ fingers as he gripped the bottle and poured them each a generous serving, up his arm, shoulder, and neck before eventually coming to his face, taking in the facial hair—Roy had never cared for it on himself but it suited Maes perfectly—and the cowlick and the  _eyes_ , those amazingly intense green eyes that had been his one weakness  _and_ his one comfort since arriving in this dreadful place…

Well then.  So much for not ogling him.

Roy leaned forward and grabbed one of the glasses before leaning back in his seat and taking a long swig.  He cradled the drink in his hands and tapped his fingers on the rim, waiting patiently.  Maes polished off his own drink in one gulp before pouring himself another one. He capped the bottle and pushed it aside, and then, finally, raised his eyes to Roy and spoke.

“Thank you for coming.”

“You’re welcome,” Roy replied, taking another sip. 

Maes cleared his throat and absentmindedly picked at the corner of a file folder.  “You look good.”  

Roy waved off the compliment and drank again, mentally scolding himself for going too fast. The last thing he wanted or needed was to get drunk.

“How are the others?” Maes asked.  “Do you see them… at all?”

“Not really.  Riza took off, not too long after you… left,” Roy explained.  “And Archer and Kimblee have made it their own personal crusade to fuck every living thing on this planet so I never have much of a chance to say hello.”

Maes smirked at Roy’s all-too-accurate assessment of their comrades.  “What about Jean?”

“Oh, Jean’s  _just fine_.... You should know that we’ve been fucking for the past twenty-five years,” Roy said with a steel glint in his eyes, savoring the stunned look on Maes’ face.  “Give or take,” he added with a casual shrug.    
  
And here, things had been going so smoothly.

He hadn’t meant to do that.  Well… no, he had  _absolutely_  meant to do that. Just not so soon.   


“Is that supposed to hurt me?” Maes asked quietly, tightly clutching his glass.

“Did it?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”  Roy stared down into the warm-colored liquid.  “Although that  _hardly_  makes us even.”

*****

Maes resisted the urge to down the rest of his drink yet again. The last thing he needed or wanted was to get drunk.

It was only normal to assume that Roy had been with others since they had parted ways.  The urges of the body were, at times, insurmountable in that regard; Maes understood that more than he cared to admit. He’d all but lost track of how many times he had been reduced to touching himself over the years as he thought about Roy, pretending that the fingers that caressed him were the same ones that had mapped their way along every inch of his skin so long ago, back when they had taken their sweet time acclimating themselves to their strange new flesh in the most enjoyable of ways. 

However, to think that he would let Jean do those things to him… 

Maes pushed aside his jealousy; this wasn’t about him. 

Roy was right. It didn’t come  _close_  to making them even.   

“No, it doesn’t,” he agreed, prying his hand away from its death-grip on the glass and folding his arms on the desktop.  “And I don’t know if there is anything I can say to you that would make you understand why I…”

“Betrayed all of us?” Roy offered.  “Betrayed  _me_?”

Now that the question was finally on the table, Maes realized that he had no idea how to even begin explaining himself. There was so much that needed to be said, but where was he supposed to start?  The conversation was already so far removed from anything he had ever imagined that he found himself at a complete loss.

But as it turned out, Roy got the ball rolling for him.

“If it had been anyone else, I wouldn’t have cared. As much.  But  _you_ …”  Roy glared accusingly at Maes.  “I thought that we were stronger than that, Maes.”

“We were.  But it wasn’t  _about_  you and me, Roy.”  Maes pressed his hand against the side of his head as he sorted through the jumble of thoughts racing through his mind.  “I just couldn't stand the absence of His presence anymore. It was killing me.”

Roy’s eyes narrowed into slits.  “And what did running back to Him get you?  You’re  _still_  stuck here, just like the rest of us.” 

“It got me His forgiveness.   _And_  the peace of mind knowing that I get to go Home when all of this is over,” Maes said. “So now I can sleep at night knowing  _that_  instead of having to drink and fuck my days away like you're apparently doing.”

He regretted the dig the second it flew from his mouth, but it was too late to take it back.     
  
Too late… it seemed as if  _everything_  was too late when it came to the two of them. 

“Congratulations,” Roy muttered, slamming the glass down on the desk and standing up.

“Roy, wait…”

“Fuck you.”

Maes stood up and called out again to his retreating back, but to no avail.  No… no, no, no, it couldn’t end like this, not like this.  But he knew that Roy’s stubborn nature was such that there wasn’t anything he could say to stop him.

Well... there  _was_  one thing.

One word.

One name.

Maes closed his eyes and opened his mouth, speaking the name that hadn’t touched his lips in the better part of two hundred years:

_“Lucifer.”_

*****

Roy froze. His arm, which had been reaching for the doorknob, fell limp by his side. 

It was a cheap and dirty move. And it worked like a charm. 

He turned around and regarded Maes’ pinched face, as if the very act of invoking his true name had pained him deeply. Not all that surprising, considering it was a name that had become synonymous across the ages with all things damnable.

But oh how  _beautiful_  it sounded falling from his lips.

Roy let out a small, tired sigh and shoved his hands deep into his pockets.  
  
“So what is all of this, Gabriel? Hm? Some roundabout way of apologizing?”

“No, not at all.” Maes moved to the front of the desk and leaned against it.  “Even if I  _was_  sorry for what I did, I know that you would never forgive me. I just wanted you to know that my decision had nothing to do with you  _or_  with us.”

“Do you honestly think I believe that?”

“How could you not?”

Roy stiffened as Maes took a step toward him. Although he truly didn’t suspect that there was any malicious intent in the other man, he kept his guard up, just in case. 

Noticing Roy’s defensiveness, Maes peeled off his useless glasses and ran a frustrated hand through his black hair. His face was a whirlwind of anger and sadness and guilt and… other things….  Things long left unspoken. 

“I stood by your side when you declared war on Heaven,” he said, risking another step in Roy’s direction, and then another.  “I turned my back on everyone… our Brothers, our  _Father_ …  Even when I  _knew_  you were going down a path that I shouldn’t have followed, I did it anyway.  For  _you_.” 

Maes was standing directly in front of Roy now, close enough to touch him. 

"I always thought that it wouldn’t matter to me whereI spent eternity as long as I could spend it with you,” he continued.  “But I just _couldn't stand_ the agony of being removed from His grace anymore.  I know you felt it, too.”

Yes, Roy  _had_ felt it. Even now, the torture of being scorned by his Maker was, at times, more than he thought he would be able to bear. It was the reason he had chosen to cling to the self-imposed numbness of his heart instead, especially after Maes had vanished.  If he could only lose himself in _that_  as opposed to the pain, then he could continue holding firm to his resolve to shun Him and everything about Him. 

“I did,” he admitted, glaring at Maes.  “But  _I_ endured it. For _you_.”

*****

Maes winced at the barb.  While he had anticipated his words of devotion would be thrown back at him in one form or another, the sheer contempt in Roy’s voice was still jarring. 

“Did it never  _once_  occur to you to simply ask for forgiveness?” he asked.

“You mean crawl back to Him the way you did?”  Roy stared at him in disbelief.  “Do you even  _remember_  what we were fighting for?  Did the days of His wrath just slip your mind?  All of this started because I dared to question our place in His precious goddamn plan—and I wasn’t even asking because I wanted to change it.  I just wanted to make sense of it. I didn’t  _want_  war. I just wanted an answer.”

He lowered his head and chuckled bitterly.  
  
“You tell me, Maes. What kind of so-called God punishes His children for exercising the  _free fucking will_  that He gave them in the first place?”

Maes had no answer for him because he was absolutely right about the way things had been.  Although the passage of time had undoubtedly softened the Father’s heart considerably, He had not  _always_ been such a gentle and loving Deity.   
  
“To hell with both of you,” Roy mumbled, turning back to the door. "Stay the fuck out of my way."

This time, Maes did not attempt to stop him.

*****

Elysia watched him storm through the back room without paying her the least bit of mind.  She sensed that he was going to seek out that boy in lieu of getting drunk, which was a good thing since Roy tended to do very...  _questionable_ things while he was drinking.    
  
It was just as well, his abrupt departure.  For his sake—and a fair bit of her own—she didn’t think he needed to know that she was Who she was.  At least, not  _yet_.  
  
And as for that boy… well… his story would be unfolding very shortly.

While she briefly considered going into the office to see Maes, she also knew that he wasn’t in the frame of mind to deal with her at the moment.  Roy had reawakened many of his old doubts, as she knew he would, and with good reason: he was absolutely right about the way things had been.  
  
But...  _this too shall pass._

Elysia had been smitten with that quaint little human saying since its inception and called it to mind whenever she was faced with having to bear witness to any of creation's suffering.      
  
So much suffering… then, and yet to come. Especially for those two.

Lucifer and Gabriel, two halves of the same whole.  
  
The First Sons of Heaven and, indeed, the Hands of God.

Bound to one another for all of eternity, whether they liked it or not. 

Even with the animosity between them, Elysia didn’t think that there was a more perfect union in all of the universes combined…

... which was why it broke her heart to know that one of them would soon cease to exist.

 


	5. Bonus - In the Beginning

_Roy gazed in fascination at his outstretched hands before peering down at his nude body in its entirety, marveling once again over the restrictive flesh that bound his true form. It was laughable, really, that humans actually thought this glorified primate shell had anything at all to do with the Father's true image, and he shook his head in pity and disbelief over the notion. Was it any wonder so many different versions of the bible existed? And each and every one of them, full of gross exaggerations and half-truths. Those stupid monkeys couldn't get a story right to save their pathetic little lives._

_Oh, just_ how long _would this confinement last? How long would he be stuck here, living and breathing and eating and pissing and shitting and whatever additional nuisances came standard with this useless chunk of meat? Roy was already well aware of the painstakingly slow crawl that denoted the passage of Earth time; a millennia in this filth-infested pit was but the blink of an eye in Heaven and Hell. Was Oblivion_ truly  _a less desirable fate than having to bear witness to the dimwitted evolution of a planet full of undeserving animals under the vast misconception that they were somehow superior to all other life in a universe they knew nothing about?_  
  
_Sometimes, he wasn't entirely sure._  
  
“ _It's not all_ that _bad, is it?”_  
  
_Before Roy could respond, he found himself captive to a pair of powerful arms, wrapping around his waist and staking their claim. He trembled heavily within the circle of those limbs, his new body still so very sensitive to any form intimate touch.  
  
Especially _ his.   
  
“ _It hurts when you read my thoughts, Gabriel.” Roy closed his eyes and pressed back against the solid wall of muscle behind him. “_ Maes _,” he corrected himself. It couldn't be helped; one did not easily shed a name used since the beginning of time._  
  
_Maes leaned over and gently nipped at Roy's earlobe, following it with a most teasing of licks. It did wonders for the dull ache in his head that had already begun to subside. There was also the matter of what was undoubtedly his_ favorite  _physical attribute, one that had found new life yet again as a result of his lover's tongue._  
  
“ _It's your own fault for forgetting to speak out loud,” Maes murmured, nuzzling his way into the crook of Roy's neck. “How else am I supposed to hear you?” Indeed, the concept of talking would take some getting used to. Unlike Roy, Maes had visited Earth on numerous occasions throughout its existence, causing a number of humans to either be rebuked as blasphemers or revered as saints... or_ both _, as with one very notable historic exception, a sweet French girl by the name of Jeanne who was executed in a gruesome way. At any rate, of course it was going to be easier for him to remember to use his words._  
  
_But for Roy, such debates quickly ceased to matter as soft lips grazed the back of his neck and trailed down to his shoulders. He squeezed his shut eyes even tighter as Maes kissed the twin scars that adorned his back, a cruel, symbolic manifestation of his former glory. However, any revulsion there was to be found by the reminder of his supposed sin was quickly undone by those firm, strong hands traversing their way along his body, one running along the smooth skin of his stomach while the other delved into the soft brush of dark hair further below._  
  
_During moments like these, spending an eternity on earth didn't seem so bad after all—  
  
*****_  
  
“Hey, watch it, jackass!”  
  
Roy blinked stupidly at the man he had inadvertently bumped into while walking along the sidewalk with his head down, oblivious to everyone and everything around him. He hadn't thought about those first years in... well,  _years_. And although the reason for the reemergence of such memories was obvious, particularly having just left the company of the one with whom he shared them, such knowledge didn't make it any less painful.  
  
Seemingly from out of nowhere, a long lost yet all-too-familiar ache settled inside of Roy's head and a scornful smirk blossomed on his face; he supposed this sort of thing might happen again now that Maes had set up shop in town.  But far from being aggravated over the invasion, as was his right, instead, Roy found rare contentment in the knowledge that he wasn't suffering alone. It served the bastard right for prying.  
  
And so he continued on, shoving his hands into his pockets and maneuvering his way down the crowded sidewalk towards the one place where he felt he needed to go, for the time being, casting aside the bitterness of his past in favor of a future unbeknownst to him... and long ago foretold. 


	6. Drawn Together

Riza watched with mild amusement as Jean held his fork between his first two fingers, not unlike a cigarette.  She was certain that he did not even realize he was doing it, and she half expected him to attempt to smoke it at any moment.  It was probably just as well that restaurants, such as the one in which they presently sat, did not allow for public smoking as he was basically a walking fire hazard in her opinion.  
  
But all amusement aside, she did not know which piece of news divulged during their conversation she found more shocking: that Roy killed Dorochet, thus more than likely sparking a feud with Greed and his cohorts that she had neither time nor desire to take part in, or that he had done so in defense of a human being.  For one who had perfected the art of apathy—or at least had done an Academy Award-worthy job of pretending that he had—it was hard for her to wrap her head around the fact that he had taken such an extraordinary risk for someone whom he had never met, and a  _human_  someone at that.

“And he was just some random kid?” she asked Jean once more for clarification.

“Some kid, yes,” he said, poking at what remained of his baked potato.  “I’m not sure how random, though.”

Riza nodded.  She had no idea what to make of this sudden turn of events.  Maes, arriving on the scene years after things had gone to shit, and Roy, killing angels and befriending complete strangers.  Plus the very fact that they were converging again, drawn together like individual moths to a single, as yet unidentifiable flame…  No.  None of it was random.  She just had yet to work out what the hell it all meant.

She refrained from speaking again until a server refilled her coffee and left the table. 

“So what are you really thinking about all of this?” she asked.

“I’m thinking that either Roy has developed an inexplicably genuine affection for the most unlikely candidate ever… or something big is about to happen.”

Riza paused and blinked at him over the rim of her coffee cup.  “Big?  How big would you say?”

Jean set down his fork and ran his fingers through his hair.  “No idea,” he muttered in frustration.  “And I could be way off for all I fucking know.  Premonition was always Maes’ thing, not mine.  But ever since I saw that boy in Roy’s bed, I’ve just had a bad feeling.  A  _really_ bad feeling.”

“Jealousy is a bad feeling, too,” she mumbled into her cup before taking a sip.

She hadn’t meant to say that at all, let alone for it to sound so curt.  But since it happened, she figured what the hell?  If things really were about to turn sour, then there was no point in mincing words.  Not anymore.

Apparently Jean felt exactly the same way:

“You should know.”

Riza gaped at him, stunned all over again.  “What does that mean?”

Jean gave her a knowing look.  “Come on, Riza.  Do you think that I don’t know why you took off the way you did?  I know that you had feelings for Roy, and that ever since he and I got together, you… what the hell is so funny?”

Shaking her head, Riza could only laugh.  And laugh some more.  And when she looked up and saw Jean’s confused expression, she laughed all over again, clapping a hand over her mouth in an attempt to contain it.  She laughed until she had tears in her eyes and an ache in her belly, and when she finally managed to get a hold of herself, she offered Jean an apologetic smile.

“Oh, Jean,” she said, wiping her eyes.  “Premonition really  _isn’t_  your thing, is it?”

*****

Ed’s first instinct was to slam the door in Roy’s face.

He hadn’t planned on answering at all in the first place, as he had assumed that it was some sort of religious zealot attempting to share with him the keys to salvation.  There was no one else he could think of who might have come calling on a Saturday afternoon anyway.  But the knocking soon proved too insistent to ignore and so he had stormed over to the door, a scowl set on his face, ready to deny whatever was being offered… and there he was.  His dark, handsome stranger from the night before, the one he had given up hope of ever seeing again.  Right there in front of him.

His first thought wasn’t really a thought at all.  It was something more of a long, rambling mantra of  _Oh my Gods_  and  _Holy shits_.  His second thought was that the man was somehow even more attractive in the light of day, something that the teen would never have believed possible after last night.  And his third thought was that his automail was embarrassingly visible because he was wearing a T-shirt and shorts.  Even though he knew that Roy already knew about it, it was still rather mortifying.

Hence, his instinct to slam the door.

“Hello, Ed.”

Ed could feel his mouth working.  Eventually his voice decided to participate.

“H-Hi.”

Roy smiled at him, and Ed thought that his heart would burst right out of his chest.

“May I come in?” he asked.

*****

At first, Roy wasn’t sure if Ed would say yes.  To be honest, he wasn’t sure if Ed would say anything, given the way he stood there wide-eyed and red-faced and slack-jawed.  It was adorable.

“Uh, y-yeah.” Ed stepped back, allowing him entrance.

The house’s interior was small but cozy.  Homey.  Nothing at all like the motels that Roy frequented.  He followed Ed into the living room and took a seat on the sofa.  He would have waited to be told to do so if not for the concern that Ed would have neglected to recall even the most basic of courtesies in his present state.  His lips quirked when he saw Ed’s eyes dart between him and a nearby chair, no doubt agonizing over where to sit, and he decided to make matters simple by scooting over to the end of the sofa, pressing close against the arm, leaving the opposite end free for the taking.

“I’m sorry for dropping by out of the blue like this,” he began.  “I remembered your address from your identification and wanted to make sure that you got home in one piece.”

Of course it wasn’t just that.  Aside from the time spent in Maes’ office, Roy had been able to think of little else besides the young man with the golden eyes and growling stomach.  Never had a human being captivated him like this, or inspired him to act so violently against one of his own.  Everything about the teen in the red coat had screamed red flag, but still, it had happened.  And now, there he was.  
  
And he had no regrets. Yet.

Ed finally took a seat on the couch---at the opposite end, just as expected.  “I did, thank you.  And thank you again for last night.”

“You’re welcome,” Roy replied.  “Again.”

Grinning nervously, Ed tucked a lock of hair behind his ear with metal fingers.  “Um… if I said or did something… embarrassing… I’m sorry.  I don’t remember much of anything except waking up in your room.”

But Roy remembered, all too well.  The image of Dorochet burning to death in front of him, screaming obscenities and cursing him in the language of Heaven, was not a vision he would soon forget.

“You were a perfect gentleman,” he reassured him.

“I was?”

“You were.”

Ed sighed shakily, clearly relieved.  “Good.”

They fell quiet for a little while, during which time Roy took in the sight of Ed’s automail.  Right arm and left leg.  The weight of it against him last night had been considerable; he could not begin to imagine how it must have felt to be permanently bound to such things, having to lug them around day after day after day.  It was intriguing yet sad in a way.  What in the world could have happened to confine him to such a fate?

_And_   _why did he care?_

Because it was rude to stare too long, Roy turned away from Ed and inspected the small table beside him.  On top of it was a framed photograph of a younger and seemingly much happier Ed with another boy.

“Brother?”

Ed jumped as if spooked.  “Huh?”

Roy picked up the picture and showed it to Ed.  “Is that your brother?”

“Oh.  Yeah, my little brother, Al.”

Roy glanced at the photo again.  Ed’s  _little_  brother looked a good head taller than him at the very least.  But it seemed wise not to speak of such things.

“He lives here with you?” he asked instead.

Ed nodded, his blond hair spilling over his shoulders.  Roy felt an absurd and overwhelming urge to sweep it back.

“He’s over at his girlfriend’s house right now.  Well… his friend… who’s a girl…”

“You’re uncertain about their relationship?”

“Yeah.  But then again, so are they.”

Roy chuckled at Ed’s wit.   A few moments later, Ed joined him.  Their eyes met briefly.  The ice was broken.

“Do you want something to drink?” Ed asked.

Roy smiled.  “Yes, please.”

*****

“So what’s the deal with the little pet angel, Maes?”

Maes tilted his head at Kimblee’s question.  “What?”

Zolf Kimblee motioned over his shoulder with his thumb.  “The kid in the other room.  You’re not up to anything weird are you?”

“Don't be disgusting, Kimblee.”

“Hey, I’m just making sure.”

Maes raised a suspicious brow.  “The two of you are moral guardians all of a sudden?”

“It may shock you to know that there are things that even  _we_  wouldn’t do,” Frank Archer added.

“You’re right,” Maes said.  “That  _does_  shock me.”

He downed his drink in two large gulps.  He then reached for the bottle on top of his desk and poured himself another glass.  Whereas he hadn’t wanted to get drunk around Roy, Maes found that he practically  _needed_  to be damn near blitzed out of his mind to deal with these two.  He cared for them dearly but boy were they a handful.

Kimblee snatched the bottle from him when he was finished and topped off his own glass.  “What about Mister Store Manager out there?”

“Oh yeah, he’s pretty fuckable.” Archer leaned towards Kimblee and absentmindedly twirled his fingers through his lover’s long hair.  “What’s he into?”

“Vaginas,” Maes replied, reclaiming his liquor.  “And I’ll thank the both of you to keep your dicks out of  _all_ my employees please.”

“Good luck with that,” Jean piped in from the doorway.

He entered the room with Riza following behind him and the trio rose to greet them.  After handshakes and hugs all around—with a quick ass-grab for Havoc by Kimblee and Archer— the five stood there, awed into a humble silence by their collective presence.

“So here we are,” Riza said some minutes later.

“Together again,” Kimblee added.

“Almost.”  Jean looked at Maes.  “Have you seen Roy yet?”

“He was here earlier,” Maes confirmed.

“He was?  What happened?”

Slowly, Maes shook his head.  It was all the explanation he cared to give at the moment.

“Okay, look. I would like to propose a change of venue before we start complaining about our fearless former leader and whatever other bullshit there is to come,” Archer said.  “Maes? Party at your house?”

“Um…”

“Come on.”

“Well…”

_“Come on._  You know you want to.”

Maes closed his eyes.  “Fine.  I just need to wrap up a few things out front first.”

“Wonderful.”  The pale-skinned man smiled triumphantly.  “Maybe your manager would like to stop by for a little—”

_“Archer.”_

“Never mind.”

Maes excused himself and walked out of the office just as Kimblee was asking Riza if she ever regretted her decision to ‘forgo the cock,’ to which she promptly responded by inviting him to suck on something equally long and hard, but made of steel.

Some things never changed.

*****

Four hours ago, when Roy first arrived on his doorstep unannounced, Ed was hardly capable of forming whole words.

“What the  _fuck_?”

Obviously he got over it.

The young man cringed and groaned as Roy successfully defeated him for the sixth time in a row at checkers.   _No one_ beat him at checkers.

Well… not until now.

“Sorry,” he said.

Roy was hardly offended.  How could he be when he was too busy winning?

“Is there anything you can’t play well?” Ed asked.

“Solitaire.”

Ed snorted laughter.  The irony was rich.

When he recovered from his initial panic over the older man’s appearance, they spent the better part of an hour talking.  For one so unaccustomed to doing so, Ed found it surprisingly easy with the enigmatic stranger.  After that, the teen invited him to stay for dinner and bought him a pizza to make up for the one he wolfed down the night before.  And proceeded to wolf down most of that one as well.  Then came the checkers and the swearing.

Ed was happy, though.  A rarity.

“Al is a senior in high school, you said?” Roy asked as he helped clear the board.  “And you’re a freshman in college?”

“I wouldn’t really even call myself that.”  Ed neatly arranged stacks of red and black checkers.  “I’m just taking a couple of online classes until I can decide on things.”

“What things?”

“… Me things, I guess.”

Roy folded the board and handed it to him.  “You don’t know what you want to do?”

Ed thought about the question as thunder rumbled overhead.  He hadn’t remembered hearing anything about rain in the forecast but he was not about to complain, not if it kept Roy there longer.  “Not really.  There are some things that I feel like I could do, or  _should_  do, but… I don’t know.” He placed the board in the box, followed by the checkers.  “I haven’t made up my mind yet.”

“You’ll figure it out,” Roy promised him.

The teen shrugged.  “Maybe.”

He closed the box and placed it on the floor, and then he leaned back on the sofa.

“This was fun.  I don’t... I don't do this very often,” he shyly admitted.

“Same here.”

Ed turned to face the man on the couch and found him staring back, studying him intently.  “So... why are you here?”

Roy eased towards Ed, close enough to reach out and sweep his hair back.  Ed shuddered under his touch but he did not move away.

“Because I  _want_ to be here.”

Ed gasped as digits trailed over his ear and down to his neck, rubbing small circles in his skin.  This was absolute insanity, letting some man he had known for less than twenty-four hours, a glorified vagrant by his own self-description, into his house and allowing him to touch him like that.  Hell, he didn’t even know his last name—

“Mustang.”

“What?”

“I never told you my last name,” Roy said, his fingers still caressing.  “It’s Mustang.”

Trembling openly now, Ed was just coherent enough to marvel at the coincidence, that Roy had revealed his last name just as he was thinking about how he did not know it.  Because surely it wasn’t as if the man could read his mind or anything like that.  To believe such a thing was… just… crazy…

Then Roy was cupping his face in his hands and kissing him, gently pushing him back against the couch while soft, warm lips danced maddeningly along his mouth before claiming it completely, tongue and all, and all the blood in Ed’s body shot to one of two places, one above and one below, and nothing else mattered.

Thunder sounded again, louder this time.

A storm was imminent.

*****

There was nothing special about the house from the outside, nothing to distinguish it from all of the other surrounding houses exactly like it in size and shape.  But where the other houses concealed unimportant humans living their unimportant lives, the human inside of  _this_  house was different.

And it had nothing to do with the fact that he was presently getting felt up by the most reviled angel in all of Heaven.  And a good chunk of Hell, too.

Greed had intended to take him while he was alone, but that did not look to be the case tonight.

Soon, though.   _Very_  soon.

For the time being, however, he resigned himself to allowing the boys to have their fun.

“Because it won’t last much longer,” he whispered in the darkness.

The demon zipped up his jacket and walked away, while around him the rain started to fall. 


	7. Harbinger

“Ed?”  
  
“Yes?”  
  
“Do you plan to stay like that for the rest of the night?”  
  
“… Yes.”  
  
Roy chuckled at the teen sitting beside him. Ed’s head was down, his face planted against the arm of the couch.  And as if that wasn’t bad enough, a throw pillow was presently covering his head, held firmly in place by flesh and metal fingers.  
  
The angel scooted closer to the young man and placed a reassuring hand on his back.  “Come on,” he said. “It’s not a big deal.”  
  
“You’re right,” was Ed’s muffled reply.  “It’s a  _huge_  fucking deal.”  
  
Roy smiled and let his fingers twirl around a lock of blond hair, admiring its softness.  He was still at a loss to explain his actions, why  _this_  human, out of all the humans over all the years of his confinement, captivated him so much.  Surely there was a reason, something beyond his knowledge and yet to be revealed.  But until then, he resigned himself to being a victim to the lure of this most intriguing soul, who was currently cowering in embarrassment over having climaxed  _way_  too soon as a result of some very skilled fondling.  
  
“Would you like me to leave?”  
  
_“No.”_  
  
Roy suspected as much.  Still, it was always best to confirm such things.  
  
“What shall I do then?” he asked, leaning back and making himself comfortable, digits never missing a twirl.  
  
“I don’t know,” Ed mumbled.  “Just… talk.  Or something.”  
  
Roy could definitely think of a  _certain_  something that they could be doing right now.  Again.  But considering Ed’s state, he was content with talking for now.  
  
“Okay.  What would you like me to talk about?”  
  
Roy waited for Ed to respond.  He briefly wondered if maybe he shouldn’t have opened himself up in such a way, allowing the boy to probe into things that were, for the time being, best left unrevealed.  Then again, it wasn’t as if Ed was likely to inquire about something as profound as whether or not he was from another realm of existence… although as it turned out, his first question  _did_  hit a little too close to home for his overall comfort:  
  
“Where are you from?”  
  
“Far away.”  It was the truth, in a manner of speaking.  “I’m… quite a long way from my home.”  
  
“Why did you leave?”  
  
“My Father and I…”  A mild frown passed over Roy’s face. “We had a very serious difference of opinion.”  
  
The corner of the pillow shifted slightly but Roy did not acknowledge it lest the little turtle retreat back into its shell.  
  
“About what?” Ed asked.  
  
Roy grinned bitterly.  “Everything.”  
  
More shifting.  Ed’s chin was visible now.  “Was it always like that?”  
  
“No,” Roy replied solemnly, shaking his head.  “In the beginning, we got along very well.  Everything was perfect.”  
  
“What happened?”  
  
_Humans happened_ , Roy wanted to say.  
  
“Things… changed,” he said instead.  
  
“I’m sorry.”  
  
“It’s not your fault.” Roy turned and found golden eyes peering at him from under the pillow.  It was inexplicably pleasing. “Are you done being embarrassed?”  
  
Ed sat up and tossed the pillow aside.  His face was still flushed but the worst, it seemed, had passed.  
  
“No,” he muttered, averting his gaze.  
  
Roy smiled again.  He was doing a damnable amount of that where Ed was concerned.  
  
“Well, you know,” he started as his fingers left Ed’s hair and trailed down his arm to intertwine with warm flesh digits.  “If it bothers you that much, we could always try again.”  
  
Without waiting for a response and more than ready to change the previous subject, Roy leaned forward and kissed the side of Ed’s neck, causing the young man to moan and shudder. He did it again and again, gradually adding his teeth and tongue into the equation, until it felt as if Ed was going to shake right out of his skin.  
  
“Roy…”  Ed’s voice was barely a whisper.  
  
“Hm?”  
  
“Why are you- _ahh!_ ”  Ed jolted as a hand slipped under his shirt and caressed his abdomen.  
  
“Why am I what?” Roy murmured into his neck.  
  
“W-Why are you doing this?”  
  
Roy pulled back and regarded an expression that was both questioning and vulnerable, and something inside of him, long dormant from neglect, began to rumble and stir, much like the thunder from the storm that started an hour ago.  
  
Why  _was_ he doing this?  
  
Well, he  _knew_ why.  Illogical as it seemed.  
  
“I like you, Ed,” he finally said, tracing his thumb along the smooth skin of Ed’s stomach.  “Normally, I don’t like…”  
  
Roy paused for a moment when he realized that he had been dangerously close to saying  _humans_.  
  
“… people. But I like you.”  
  
Then they were kissing again, slowly, deeply.  Roy did not know, could not have  _possibly_  known, that Edward Elric would have an indirect bearing on the fate of mankind.  But when tentative hands wrapped around his neck and pulled him close, whatever concerns he  _did_  have about their unlikely union ceased to matter.  
  
The bond between them, unfathomable as it was, had formed.  
  
As it was meant to be.  
  
*****  
  
They sat huddled around Maes’ kitchen table, various sizes of drinking glasses pushed to the side in favor of various bottles of liquor.  The rain had died down a fair bit in the last thirty minutes, but it was still too wet outside to even consider moving the festivities there.  
  
Maes cradled a bottle of Jim Beam in his hands and looked at the faces of his brethren.  While he was happy to see them again—yes, even Archer and Kimblee—there was still a distinct difference between them all now, something that had not existed decades ago, the last time they were together.  
  
And  _he_  was that difference.  
  
They still got along well, same as before.  But underneath it all, things just weren’t the same anymore.  Things would never be the same again.  And while he had never once regretted his decision to seek the Father’s forgiveness, Maes was still somewhat saddened by the realization.  But there would be time to worry about that later.  
  
As for right now, there was the very real and very grave issue of Roy’s most uncharacteristic behavior and how it all tied into the dread that Maes was feeling.  Something was happening.  Something monumental and, perhaps, irreparable.  Something that started the night Roy torched Dorochet to protect a human named Ed.  
  
All the pieces of the puzzle were there, as far as he knew, laid out in full view.  But Maes just couldn’t figure out how the hell they all fit together.  
  
“So do we really need to worry about this Greed guy?” he asked.  “Is he really stupid enough to take on Roy?  Or  _any_  of us?”  
  
“Stupid has nothing to do with it,” Jean said.  “Roy killed one of his horde.  In a bad fucking way.”  The blond took a sip of alcohol and winced as he swallowed.  “But this feels… I don’t know…  _bigger_  than that.  I don’t think that we’d all be sitting here if it was just because some demon and his lackeys decided to pick a fight that they have no chance of winning.  At least not without some major backup.”  
  
Riza nodded in agreement.  “This thing with Dorochet… what if it’s just a catalyst for something else?”  
  
“That could be,” Archer said.  “Something to do with this boy that we know nothing about.”  
  
“Roy despises the meatbags more than any of us,” Kimblee added.  “There has to be a reason that he suddenly has his dick in knots over this one.”  
  
Kimblee’s ever so colorful choice of wording left a bitter taste in Maes’ mouth, more so than the alcohol.  It was one thing to know that Roy had fucked others with no emotional attachment, hence Maes’ ability to sit less than three feet away from Jean without the urge to choke him.  Well,  _much_  of an urge, anyway.  But that this human, this  _Ed_ , meant enough for him to take such a risk… He didn’t want to think about what it might mean.  
  
“We should talk to him before it’s too late,” Riza suggested.  “Try to feel him out.”  
  
“Feel him out?  Hell, Archer and I have been trying to do that for about a hundred years,” Kimblee said with a coy smile.  
  
“Oh, for fuck’s sake.  Could the two of you be any more perverted?” Jean asked as he rose to his feet.  
  
“We’re working on it,” Archer responded.  
  
Jean opened his mouth to speak.  When he realized that there was really nothing to be said where the deviant duo was concerned, he simply shook his head in defeat.  “I’m going to take a piss,” he announced.  
  
“Need help with that?” Kimblee offered.  
  
“Kiss my…”  Jean remembered who he was talking to and reconsidered.  “Never mind,” he said, walking out of the kitchen.  
  
As Riza took Archer and Kimblee to task for their inappropriateness, Maes stared thoughtfully at the door through which Jean had exited.  He took a sip of his drink (and almost choked when Archer brazenly asked Riza if he could see her tits) then decided that now was as good a time as any to do what he intended to do.  
  
He wasn’t thrilled about the fact that Jean and Roy were having sex.  Or  _had_  been, the way that Jean made it sound.  Even if it meant nothing, it was still more than Maes presently had with Roy, and that was a very hard pill to swallow.  But if things progressed the way he suspected they might—something he could not divulge to the group without revealing Elysia’s true Identity— then he was going to need Jean’s help.  
  
Maes hoped that he was wrong.  He wanted  _nothing more_  than to be wrong.  But if he was right… well, it never hurt to be prepared.  
  
Even for the end.  
  
*****  
  
There was a little girl sitting on the bottom of the stairs, clutching a large brown teddy bear and watching Jean in a way that would have been off-putting if she hadn’t been so cute.  
  
“Hello,” he said as he stepped out of the bathroom.  “Elysia, right?”  
  
The child nodded, and only then did Jean remember that she was a mute.  He was extremely curious as to why she was in such a way; to his knowledge, no other angel had ever been harmed or otherwise negatively impacted during transubstantiation.  It was a painful process, akin to being slowly ripped apart and put back together again.   But it never caused permanent physical injury when all was said and done.  
  
Because he was in no hurry to deal with Archer and Kimblee’s advances— not to mention Maes’ subtle rebuke—Jean sat down beside her and stretched out his long legs.  He considered lighting up but thought it unwise; even though smoke would not hurt their kind, it still felt like a pretty rude thing to do around one so young.  
  
“We didn’t wake you up, did we?” he asked.  
  
Elysia shook her head, her tiny pigtails flopping to and fro.  
  
“Couldn’t sleep?”  
  
A shrug this time.  Jean was uncertain if that was a yes or a no or something else that he could not decipher.  How in the world did Maes communicate with her on a daily basis?  
  
They sat in silence, which was easy to do when one of them had no other choice.  But it wasn’t an awkward silence, as much as it probably should have been.  Jean was actually, surprisingly, comforted by the little girl’s presence.  Something about her felt… familiar. She reminded him of Heaven.  As far as he remembered it, at any rate.  
  
“So… um…”  He tried to think of things that could be answered with a nod or shake of the head.  “Is this your first time here?”  
  
Elysia shook her head again.  
  
“Do you like it?” Jean asked.  
  
A shrug and a nod.  Jean didn’t want to presume, but he thought that he had this particular combination figured out.  
  
“Yeah, it’s nothing like Home, is it?”  
  
An emphatic shake of the head this time.  Jean thought it unbearably precious.  
  
“I know what you mean, kiddo.  There’s no place like Home.”  
  
Elysia’s smile was wide and knowing.  The _Wizard of Oz_ reference did not go unnoticed.  
  
“… I miss it,” Jean said quietly.  “Sometimes.”  He folded his arms and leaned forward on his knees, staring blindly at the carpet.  “ _Most_  times,” he amended with a shrug of his own.  “But I guess we’re all hard-wired for that kind of thing, huh?”  
  
Before Elysia could offer an unspoken reply, her attention was diverted as Maes entered the living room.  
  
“Jean?  Where are… oh.  There you are.”  
  
“Hey.  Elysia and I were just shooting the breeze.”  Jean turned to look at the child.  “You should go back to bed now,” he told her.  “Thank you for keeping me company.”  
  
Elysia nodded obediently and stood up from the step.  Jean gave her a parting wink and found himself captive to a strong and sudden embrace that was over before he fully realized what had happened.  Elysia then darted up the stairs, hair and nightgown bobbing with each step before disappearing into her bedroom.  
  
“Who is she, Maes?” Jean asked.   _“Really.”_  
  
Maes smiled softly.  “A very special little girl.”  
  
Jean nodded.  She was indeed.  Even if Maes did not care to tell him  _why_.  
  
“I guess we should get back into the kitchen before Riza shoots those two,” he said.  
  
Maes pushed up his glasses.  “I was wondering if we could talk first.”  
  
Jean did not find the look on Maes’ face comforting at all.  
  
“Look, Maes.  If this is about Roy…”  
  
“Actually, it is.”  Maes took a step towards him.  “But not in the way you think.”  
  
*****  
  
Ed didn’t think that he would ever stop smiling.  Of course he would when he finally fell asleep but right now, even that seemed debatable.  Not when he could still feel Roy, everywhere, all over his skin and making him shiver at the memory of his touch.  
  
He stretched out in his bed and replayed the night over and over again.  He and Roy had done just about everything that two people could possibly do with their clothes (barely) on.  Ed never would have guessed that jerking off was a  _lot_  more fun when someone else was doing it to him.  And who knew just how pleasurable the seemingly simple act of friction could be?  
  
So  _very_ pleasurable.  
  
Sometime later, he heard the quiet sounds of Al sneaking into the house.  Normally, he would have chewed the teen out for not calling to tell him that he was going to be late, but this time Ed decided to give him a pass.  Besides, if Al  _had_ come home earlier, he would have found Ed in a position that Ed was not ready to explain.  If Al was going to meet Roy, he should meet him properly.  
  
Like tomorrow evening.  When Roy came over for dinner.  
  
Ed’s smile widened.  He closed his eyes and sighed as he pondered this strange phenomenon known as happiness.  
  
He also made a mental shopping list of all the things he needed to pick up tomorrow from that new grocery store down the road…  
  
*****  
  
Elysia could not speak.  
  
But she could dream.  
  
She was standing in the middle of a large playground, one that was deserted and dilapidated.  Somehow, the most unsettling aspect of the place was that there were no children to be found.  No little ones, no laughter, no joy.  Just rot and emptiness.  Like a graveyard.  
  
And she knew right away what it meant, before he even spoke.  
  
“They are all going to die, you know.  Your precious, fallen children.”  
  
Elysia turned around and found herself face to face with a man dressed in a suit and wearing an eye patch.  Except that he wasn’t really a man at all.  
  
“Of course, you  _could_  help them,” he continued.  “But you won’t.  You never do. Not very Fatherly of you, is it?”  
  
He chuckled with cruel merriment as a merry-go-round crumbled to ash behind him.  
  
“What an awful thing it is to be bound to you.  Can you blame me for welcoming them to Hell with open arms?”  
  
Having had his say, the man began to walk away.  “Go to sleep now, Little Lord,” he said, waving at her over his shoulder.  “Tomorrow is going to be a very important day.”  
  
_I’ll see you soon._  
  
Elysia opened her eyes and blinked into the darkness, contemplating.  
  
It was the first time that he had ever dared to confront her, even in a dream. She was not sure what he had hoped to accomplish by doing so; he, more than any other, should have known that she did not frighten so easily.  She worried.  Oh, how she worried.  But fear was not in her creed.  Especially fear of the Father of Lies.  
  
After all, was she not the  _Father_  of the Father of Lies?  
  
Elysia rolled over in the bed, seeking out the coolness of untouched sheets and tightening the grip on her teddy bear.  
  
He had been right about one thing.  Tomorrow  _was_  going to be a very important day.  
  
Quite possibly the beginning of the end of  _all_  days.  
  
And all because of a boy who did not even believe in God or Heaven or angels.  
  
Irony at its finest.


	8. Confrontation

“I tell you, I would bow at the feet of the person responsible for creating bacon,” Archer said as he shoved a slice of the crisp and salty goodness into his mouth.  “Twice, even.”  
  
“Nothing like starting the day with a little blasphemy,” Riza murmured into her coffee, which almost caused Jean to choke on his scrambled eggs when he unintentionally snorted laughter mid-swallow.  
  
“Come on,” Kimblee argued in defense of his partner.  “You have to admit that it is rather sinfully delicious stuff.”  
  
While neither Jean nor Riza denied the claim, they did stop short at voluntary damnation to express their enjoyment of all things pork.  
  
From his spot at the head of the kitchen table, Maes calmly sipped on his orange juice and watched as his companions continued discussing the righteousness of salt-cured meats.  Last night, as a result of getting properly hammered, the five angels ended up crashing in various spots on Maes’ living room floor, dead to the world until the rising sun demanded otherwise.  After checking in on Elysia, who had miraculously slept through the drunken debacle, Maes dutifully prepared breakfast for his guests, including the bacon over which they now emphatically debated.  He had to check in at the store soon, but instructed the others to stay put until he returned so that they could finalize how they planned to proceed with Roy.  
  
“You wanna weigh in here, Maes?” Jean asked through a mouthful of toast.  
  
“Like he would be swayed by anything as insignificant as dead pig meat,” Kimblee muttered.  “Not our Maes.”  
  
It was an innocent enough dig on the surface.  Even so, given the ever so slight emphasis on the second part of that statement, Maes knew damn well what Kimblee was subtly hinting at.  Now that they were all sober, he thought that it was as good a time as any to confront it directly, head on, before they had to deal with whatever was to come regarding Greed and Roy and the human named Ed.  
  
_Roy’s_  human.  Although it turned Maes’ stomach to think of him like that.  
  
He pushed his plate forward, bringing his arms to rest on top of the table.  “Okay guys.  Let me have it.  Whatever you want to get off your chest about the past.”  Maes looked up, meeting the gazes of his companions.  “Please,” he added softly.  
  
The room fell silent and remained that way for quite some time. Maes was not deterred; he was determined not to speak until the issue was addressed once and for all.  And while he had assumed that it would be either Archer or Kimblee who would take full advantage of the open floor, being that they were undoubtedly the most outspoken of the group, Maes was stunned when Riza was the one who finally spoke first.  
  
“You left us,” she said, shaking her head.  “After everything we went through… after everything we fought for…. I’m not saying that I don’t understand why you did it because I do.  I miss Him, too.  We  _all_  do.  But still, it just…”  
  
“Fucking sucks,” Jean concluded as he pulled a cigarette from the pack lying on the table beside him.  
  
“Although I suppose we should have seen it coming,” Archer suggested.  
  
“What do you mean?” Maes asked.  
  
Jean lit a cigarette and took a deep drag before answering.  “Well… you were always… different… from the rest of us.”  
  
Maes already had an idea where this was going, but still, he had to ask.  “Different how?”  
  
“You never had to do any of the grunt work,” Kimblee explained.  “You were the one who got to go around and befriend the humans and spread the ‘good word’ and all of that bullshit.”  
  
“Sure, you saw the Father’s fury,” Riza elaborated.  “But you never had to  _act_  on it.”  
  
“I had no control over what I was asked to do,” Maes insisted.  “We each had duties we were expected to fulfill.”  
  
“Duties, huh?”  Kimblee leaned back in his seat and folded his arms.  “Why don’t you try killing a bunch of children in their sleep to teach some Pharaoh a lesson?  Do that and then tell me that you were just doing your duty.”  
  
Maes remembered that, all too well.  And the human retelling of that tale came nowhere close to scratching the true surface of that dark event.  It was little wonder that Kimblee had so fiercely hardened his heart against humanity.  Not so much because he truly hated them deep down, but because he no longer wanted to care.  What a horrible thing it was to have to take an innocent life because it served some grander, unseen purpose.  
  
“You know that I didn’t agree with the way certain things were being done,” Maes began, choosing his words very carefully.  “I absolutely  _hated_  some of the things He asked us to do.  But it isn’t our place to question Him.  I know that now. We angels bitch and moan about how the humans presume to know His will but you know what?  We’re not much better.”  
  
He peeled off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose, eyes closed, contemplating.  
  
“I love you guys.  I really do.  So tell me what to do to fix this so that we can move past it for good.”  
  
More silence.  After a while, Archer cleared his throat and spoke up.  “I think I speak for all of us when I say that there’s only one thing you  _can_  do to rectify this situation.”  
  
“And what would that be?” Maes asked, expecting the worst.  
  
Four plates were simultaneously raised in the air.  
  
“Bacon,” the angels demanded.  
  
And just like that, any bad feelings over Maes’ past actions were laid to rest. For good.  
  
He smiled gratefully at Jean and Riza and Kimblee and Archer. In those dwindling hours before catastrophe struck, if that was all it took to make them happy, then so be it.  
  
*****  
  
Elysia smiled as she listened to the commotion downstairs, ignoring her growling tummy in favor of delighting in the laughter of angels.  It was a lovely sound, one that was far preferable to the screaming soon to come.  
  
She climbed out of bed with a stretch and a yawn and then toddled over to the far corner of her room where dozens of teddy bears were piled.  Maes had bought her one in practically every color that existed, which was embarrassingly excessive.  Her tiny fingers grazed the softness of a pink bear, one of the prettiest out of the whole bunch.  Plus it would go so well with the dress that he had set out for her to wear that day.  But ultimately, and not without some disappointment, she opted to take a smaller black bear instead.  
  
The blood would not be nearly as noticeable on that one.  
  
With that decided, Elysia walked over to the door and waited.  Although she was starving and now had to pee something fierce, she also had no desire to break up the festivities.  They would be parting ways soon enough since Maes had to be at the store in a couple of hours, and so she wanted them to enjoy the time they had left together without interruption.  
  
Even behind the closed door, she could smell Jean’s cigarette smoke wafting up the stairs.  It had pleased her greatly to “talk” to him the night before.  Of course she was well aware of a different sort of conversation that had taken place, one that Maes had with him shortly afterwards.  Even though Maes only knew glimpses of the truth at this point and was acting more on speculation and instinct than actual fact, his decision to enlist Jean’s aid was the best thing that he could have done.  
  
Because Jean Havoc—  _Uriel_ — was the only one among them capable of fighting fire with fire.  
  
*****  
  
Roy ducked his head under the stream of water blasting from the showerhead to rinse his hair of the shampoo lathered into it.  
  
If only he could also rinse away that damn smile while he was at it.  
  
He had stayed in bed until noon, although he was wide awake hours beforehand.  Partly because he could feel the others converging.  It had been much easier to ignore last night, when he was far too preoccupied with making Ed come to pay it any mind.  But now, without the distraction, their gathering weighed on his conscience and almost made him long for the days of old when all they had was each other.  
  
The other reason, the _main_ reason, he had been unable to sleep past sunrise was because of Ed.  Ed was all he could think about, and doing so made him disgustingly happy.  While Roy hated to think that there was a deeper, greater purpose behind his feelings, that the connection he and Ed shared was just some well-calculated move by a higher power for some convoluted reason yet to be revealed, it did not negate the fact that he had finally found something on that otherwise useless floating rock that gave him peace.  As a result, he had every intention of pursuing it, and protecting it, at all costs.  
  
When he was finished rinsing, Roy stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around his waist.  He grabbed another one and draped it over his dripping hair, then walked out of the bathroom…  
  
… and summoned flame in his right hand while glaring at the man sitting on his bed, the man who was not a man at all.  
  
“Now, now.  Put that away, Lucifer.  I didn’t come here to fight.”  
  
Even through his uninvited guest’s human disguise, which included an eye patch for some unknown reason, Roy could sense the overwhelming presence of the one who had, for all intents and purposes, stolen his identity.  He was the absolute purest form of evil, and one never,  _ever_  to be taken lightly.  
  
“What do you want, Satan?”  
  
“I need to talk to you.”  
  
Roy stripped the towel from his head and let it drop to the floor. He knew better than to be swayed but he was still curious as to why the demon had presented himself.  “About what?”  
  
“Your little human,” Satan replied, crossing his legs and making himself comfortable.  “And the grave danger that he is about to face.”  
  
Roy took a step in his direction, ready to burn.  “If you do anything to hurt him…”  
  
Satan waved off the threat.  “Don’t be silly,” he said.  “Edward Elric’s survival is actually very important to me. More than you could possibly know.  Now you can either stand there and waste more time or you can have a seat and I will tell you why.”  
  
Gradually, the flame in and around Roy’s hand dissipated.  “If Ed’s in danger then I need to leave right now.”  
  
“There is enough time for you to hear this,” the demon reassured him.  Although there was hardly ever any  _real_  reassurance when it came to the Prince of Darkness, the Father of Lies, and all of the other names he had rightfully earned over the span of existence.  
  
Roy reluctantly took a seat near the chair by the bed, all of his happy feelings now laced with apprehension and dread.  It would have been one thing if Ed had some role in the Father’s grand design.  Roy did not believe that he would ever see eye-to-eye with his Maker again, but if all of this had been His doing, then at least there was a chance that Ed would have been in good hands.  Only a  _chance_ , because Roy knew from personal experience that the Almighty was not above sacrificing a human life for reasons known only to Him.  
  
But if Satan was telling the truth— his version of it, at any rate—and Ed’s existence was vital for all the wrong reasons... a hindrance…  
  
“Okay, asshole.  Tell me  _everything_.”  
  
Satan smiled.  
  
Then he began to speak.  
  
*****  
  
As far as Ed was concerned, there was nothing that separated this store from any other around town, except the fact that it was brand, spanking new and that it was within walking distance from his house.  So while it was nice to see that the place had not yet fallen victim to careless shoppers and disorganization, overall it was still just a store.  
  
He roamed the aisles with a small basket held in a tight gloved grip, golden eyes crawling over the vast selection of items in search of the ones he would need to cook dinner for Roy.  Ed decided on pasta because he thought it almost impossible to fuck that up (though if anyone could…) and came across an infinite display of sauces he now had to choose from.  There were some with added veggies or cheeses or garlic or meat or varying combinations thereof.  There were canned sauces and jarred sauces and even packets where one simply added whatever the fuck.  Not to mention that Ed had no idea if Roy had any allergies that would turn a mediocre meal— he wasn’t aiming high, as you could tell— into a trip to the emergency room.  
  
“Damn it,” he whispered.  
  
Too late to fret, however.  He had already committed to the endeavor.  Now, he would just have to pick the least potentially hazardous sauce he could find and hope that it didn’t taste bland as all hell.  On the top shelf, Ed spotted a jar bearing a kindly Italian lady’s image and decided that was his best bet.  There was just one little problem.  
  
He couldn’t  _reach_  the top shelf.  
  
Ed glanced around and tried to calculate the odds of stepping onto the lower shelf to reach the jar without causing a scene and/or breaking a bone. He knew that he could always ask for help but unfortunately that required talking to people and showcasing his lack of stature, two things he did not want to do. Luckily, he did not have to wait long to decide as a tall, dark-haired man soon approached him and offered his assistance.  
  
“Thanks,” Ed mumbled as he took the jar from the stranger, his face red with embarrassment.  
  
“You’re very welcome.  I hope that you’re finding everything else you need.”  
  
He was not wearing any sort of uniform or nametag, yet to Ed, he sounded as if he owned the place.  
  
The stranger smiled warmly and extended his left hand.  “Maes Hughes. I own the place.”  
  
Now that he mentioned it, Ed recognized his face from the photo display towards the front of the store. He also thought it odd that the man had offered his left hand.  He knew his automail was properly covered so that had nothing to do with it.  Maybe the guy was left-handed?  Whatever the case, it saved him the trouble of having to expose his artificial limb.  
  
Ed had anticipated that he would cringe when the man shook his hand, a natural reaction to being touched by people he hardly knew.  With one very notable exception.  
  
But surprisingly enough, that was not the case this time.  
  
“Edward,” he responded.  And then, because it felt like the right thing to do, he added, “Elric.”  
  
“It’s very nice to meet you, Edward Elric.”  The owner released Ed’s hand and took a step backwards.  “I hope we’ll see you again soon.”  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
Ed watched him walk away, where he paused just long enough to greet a trio of women who, as far as Ed could tell, refrained from climbing all over him only in the interest of public decency.  After a good chuckle over the scene, Ed resumed shopping, heading over to the dessert aisle to find a cake.  Perhaps even two, considering Al’s appetite.  And his own.  
  
And after that, he headed towards the checkout, far too distracted by his eagerness over the coming evening to notice the green eyes that watched him like a hawk, from the time he unloaded his basket up until he walked out of the store with bags in hand.  
  
*****  
  
Maes waited until Ed disappeared through the exit before heading to the back, sparing a wave for the employees loitering about in the break room and then entering his office and shutting the door behind him.  He leaned against it and closed his eyes, his mind furiously trying to wrap around what he now knew, the revelation that hit him like a physical blow the moment he laid eyes on the young man, the truth of Ed’s fate and Roy’s role in it.  
  
As well as his own.  
  
“I don’t suppose You’d be willing to take it all back?” he asked the little girl sitting at his desk.  
  
Elysia glanced up from her coloring book.  Even though she couldn't speak, Maes already knew the answer to that particular query.  He knew by way of his own words, spoken just that morning, that came back to haunt him with a vengeance:  
  
_It isn’t our place to question Him._  
  
“As You wish, Father.”  
  
Maes nodded and sighed and held out his hand.  The time had come to seal man’s fate.  One way or another.  
  
“Let’s go.”  
  
*****  
  
Jean felt it first.  The unavoidable calling that had brought them all together in the first place.  
  
But this time it was stronger than ever.  
  
“Do you feel that?” he asked Riza.  
  
Judging by the look on her face, he already knew the answer.  
  
Kimblee and Archer came down the stairs, both of them struggling to button their shirts and zip their pants as they descended the steps.  For the couple to actually  _stop_  desecrating Maes’ bed was an indication of just how serious the situation was.  
  
“Looks like it’s started,” Jean said.  
  
“ _What’s_  started?” Riza wanted to know.  
  
Jean thought back to his conversation with Maes the night before, to all the things Maes suspected.  All the things he feared.  
  
And Jean hoped more than anything that Maes was wrong.  
  
“I suppose we better go find out.”  
  
*****  
  
“So... now you know.”  
  
Satan leveled his one-eyed stare on the fallen angel sitting across from him.  He was dressed now.  Regrettably.  
  
Age after age, Satan had never once tired of beholding Lucifer’s restrained torment.  His suffering was a thing of unprecedented beauty.  And, to be uncharacteristically honest, there was always the added thrill of knowing that the Other One still felt His firstborn’s pain.  
  
But even this, the sheer depth of Lucifer’s attachment to that boy, came as a bit of a shock.   Very well.  All the better to ensure Satan’s plans for the future.  Of course he would improvise if need be, as he had done in the past.  That which was foretold always came to pass one way or another, regardless of attempted intervention.  However, just this once, it would be nice if all the pieces fell into place as they should.  
  
He hadn’t lied when he said that Ed’s survival was vital to him. But it was the  _result_  of Ed’s survival that was most pertinent.  Not just to Satan himself but to those closest to Ed as well.  
  
Namely his brother, Alphonse.  The effect to Ed’s cause.  
  
Because while Ed’s life was indeed important, Al’s was downright  _crucial._  
  
Yet another need-to-know tidbit that Lucifer did not need to know.  
  
“You should go now,” he said, rising to his feet.  “Edward is about to make the acquaintance of an especially violent demon, one who feels a dire need to repay you in kind for burning his friend to a crisp.” Satan felt no need to divulge that he was the one who sent Greed on the warpath in the first place.  What the angel didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him.  And if it did, well that was hardly his concern.  
  
He met Roy (ugh, such a  _dreadful_  name) at the door, blocking his progress.  
  
“Get out of my way,” Roy growled at him.  
  
“I will. But first…”  
  
The demon raised his hand to Roy’s face and brought it down in a quick and smooth swiping motion.  It was a seemingly unimportant gesture.  One that most certainly  _wasn’t_.  
  
“There you go,” Satan murmured, stepping aside.  
  
Roy gave him a parting glare before taking off, his curiosity about his enemy’s odd last-second behavior trumped by his need to find Ed.  
  
Satan leaned against the doorway and grinned.  
  
“You’re welcome.”  
  
*****  
  
_I’ve been here before._  
  
Even though Ed had far more pressing matters to address, namely the guy standing in front of him who did not appear to have Ed’s best intentions at heart, the thought flashed through the teen’s mind all the same when he glanced at his surroundings, having been forced into the small alley by the bar where he first met Roy.  Although he still drew a blank when he tried to remember that night, there was something about his present location that seemed familiar.  And not necessarily in a good way.  
  
“Look,” he said, trying to sound calmer than he felt.  “I don’t have any money and I really don’t want to hurt you.”  
  
_This little asshole just broke my wrist._

Ed shook his head, his mind overrun by the sudden memory of words not spoken by him.  
  
_What the hell was that?_  
  
“Hurt me?  That’s cute.”  The man began moving towards Ed, forcing him deeper into the alley.  “You can blame your pal, Roy, for this.  For having the fucking balls to kill my friend over a piece of shit human like you.”  
  
_… Wh-What do you mean, humans?_  
  
“Roy… killed someone?”  
  
Ed shook his head again, torn between bits and pieces of a conversation he could not recall and this guy’s outlandish assertion that Roy had killed another man—  
  
_Doorshay… no, Dorochet…_  
  
— because of him.  
  
Because of a piece of shit human like him.  
  
_Why is he calling me a human like he isn’t one?_  
  
“What the fuck?”  Ed dropped his bags and gripped his head, the impending danger to his body taking a backseat to the present danger to his mind, which felt as if it might cave in on itself at any moment.  
  
The stranger paused and tilted his head, genuinely intrigued by this sudden turn of events.  
  
“…You have no idea what I’m talking about, do you?”  
  
*****  
  
Greed laughed.  And laughed and laughed.  
  
He supposed that it really wasn’t all that nice, finding so much humor in the sight of a human mind on the verge of collapse.  
  
Oh well.  Tough shit.  
  
He was going to kill this boy. Very slowly. Very painfully. Until he died cursing Roy and God and Heaven and anyone or anything else that Greed could think of while he was at it.  
  
But first, he was going to have a little fun.  
  
Greed advanced slowly, his booted footsteps echoing ominously in the alley.  
  
“Well then.  Why don’t I refresh your memory?”


	9. Lifting the Veil

Maes felt it as soon as he exited the store, the overwhelming sense of something gone very, very wrong. It hung in the air all around, thick like smoke, and he tightened his grip on Elysia’s tiny hand, his instinct to protect the delicate incarnation of his Father kicking into overdrive.  
  
Green eyes intently scanned the faces of Sunday afternoon shoppers and passers-by. At a glance, nothing  _seemed_  out of sorts. However, he could not shake the ominous feeling that evil was nearby. Adding to that concern was the fact that Edward Elric, the human upon whose existence mankind hinged, had just left the store, blissfully unaware of his role in an event foretold ages ago.  
  
He started walking down the sidewalk with Elysia in tow, every single step leading them closer to the source of all his bad feelings. No thought was spared for the establishment he was leaving behind. Price checks and refunds could wait.  
  
The others were drawing close as well. Maes could feel them all, and the invisible line tethering them was pulling tighter with every passing second. Jean, Riza, Archer, Kimblee… and Roy.  
  
Whatever was going to happen, whatever the true reason he and his brethren had been called together in the first place, it all started  _now_.  
  
*****  
  
Ed remembered.  
  
He remembered  _everything_.  
  
The horrific angle of Dorochet’s broken wrist, rendered so by Ed after he had gotten just a little too grabby. Roy’s sudden appearance, like some reluctant savior, and the way that his voice had invaded Ed’s mind, berating him for failing to run away. The casual reveal that Roy and Dorochet were not only not human, but something that could not have possibly existed.  
  
And the fire. Ed recalled the fire that blazed through the alley just as he passed out, reducing Dorochet to a smoldering lump of burnt flesh.  
  
The very notion was astoundingly preposterous to someone who had spent a lifetime not believing in anything that he could not see with his own two eyes. But even if he had wanted to reject the idea, the fact that he  _had seen_  what Roy could do eliminated any chance of denial.  
  
Roy Mustang.  
  
The same Roy Mustang who had kissed and touched him so very gently and thoroughly just the night before.  
  
The same Roy Mustang who had brought Ed to two mind-shattering orgasms before allowing Ed to return the favor.  
  
… And the same Roy Mustang who had told him that the oddly symmetrical scars on his shoulder blades were from a long ago accident.  
  
He was… he was an…  
  
“... angel.” Ed spoke the word as if he had never heard it before, his head shaking steadily as his mind tried to contain everything he now knew to be true.  
  
“Yes,” the stranger named Greed said, his lips curving upward and revealing pointed teeth. “And not just any angel, but the first. The  _favorite._  Or at least he was until he decided to grow a pair and talk back.”  
  
Ed was even more confused now, which was quite the feat under the circumstances. “What?”  
  
“Oh, for fuck’s sake. Don’t you know even a  _little_  bit about that stupid bible you monkeys love so damn much?” Now it was Greed’s turn to gawk in disbelief. “Lucifer, dumbass. Your pal Roy is Lucifer. The Angel of Light. Son of the Morning. The Morning Star. Any of those ring a bell?”  
  
While Ed knew nothing of the various names Greed had mentioned, he did know of one, the one that even an atheist such as himself would have heard throughout the years.  
  
He swallowed hard, his mouth as dry as a desert.  
  
“... Satan? You’re… you’re saying that Roy is Satan?”  
  
“That’s actually the one thing he isn’t,” Greed replied with a grin. “Boy, did you people get that one wrong. Big time. And for the record, I think it really pisses him off.”  
  
He took a step closer to Ed, who was too shocked to do anything other than remain rooted in place.  
  
“You should have just let Dorochet fuck you, kid. It probably wouldn’t have been all that good, but it would have been over soon enough. Then you could have gone home and forgotten all about it and continued on with your measly little life. But now…”  
  
Another step. Not quite yet within touching distance, but close.  _Dangerously_  close.  
  
“Now I get to kill you.  
  
*****  
  
Roy was not remotely winded even though he had been running non-stop since leaving his room. Although his human form could withstand a lot, it was still subject to eventual exhaustion like anyone else’s. But because his primary concern right now—his  _only_  concern right now—was getting to Ed, it never occurred to him to find it strange that he exhibited none of the usual signs one might when pushing their body to the limit for an extended period of time.  
  
He vaguely wished that he had his wings. While the fire had its uses, it did fuck all for getting him where he needed to go in a hurry. His present dilemma would have been easily resolved with just a simple uncasing and then up, up, and away—  
  
Roy stopped suddenly as soon as he sensed it, unmindful of the curious and worried glances around him. For a moment, Ed vanished completely from the center of his thoughts, so stunned was Roy at what he discovered.  
  
His wings… they were back.  
  
He could feel them lurking just beneath his skin, poised and ready to spring forth in all of their fiery awesomeness. That was another thing that the humans had always gotten wrong. To believe the story as they told it, one would think that angels were hardly more than glorified birds.  
  
Also, that was not the only thing that was different about him.  
  
Roy slowly lifted his arm and gazed in wonder at the palm of his hand.  
  
“It can’t be,” he whispered.  
  
Yet it was. He had not drawn his sword since before the fall but there it was, sheathed in nothingness, ready and waiting to materialize at his command.  
  
While Roy’s true form was still restricted by a cage of flesh and bone, he was, as much as he could be, whole again.  
  
_But when…?_  
  
There was no need to finish the question. Roy knew  _exactly_  when it had happened.  
  
What the hell had Satan done to him?  
  
And more specifically,  _why_?  
  
*****  
  
_“Greed!”_  
  
Maes glared at the demon, who had moved behind Ed and seized him by the neck the second he became aware of the angel’s presence. He knew that he had to proceed with caution; while he was fairly certain that Greed would not act until Roy was present, he had no desire to take any unnecessary chances.  
  
He saw the whirlwind of confusion and trepidation on Ed’s face and felt a stab of pity for the boy who had done absolutely nothing wrong outside of being born an Elric. But before Maes could offer him any potential words of comfort, Greed struck Ed across the back of his skull with quick and deadly accuracy, rendering him unconscious.  
  
“I know I could have just hand-waved it but that was a lot more fun,” he said as he caught Ed in his arms and scooped him over his shoulder. “Damn, he’s heavy.”  
  
“Listen, Greed,” Maes began. “I don’t know you and you don’t know me—”  
  
“Oh, I know damn well who you are,  _Gabriel_ ,” Greed snarled. “You’re the one who went running back to Daddy because you couldn’t hack it here on Earth.”  
  
He frowned briefly as his eyes passed over Elysia, and then returned his attention to the angel, none the wiser.  
  
The statement did not bother Maes at all. It was, at its core, a plain and simple truth.  
  
“Don’t do this,” he tried again. “If you have a problem with Roy, confront him. Don’t take this out on a human.”  
  
“I’m taking it out on a human  _because_  I have a problem with Roy. Besides, this one’s not just any regular human.” Greed paused, his eyes narrowing into slits and his tone low and accusatory. “But you already  _know_  that, don’t you?”  
  
“Yes,” Maes admitted. “I know.”  
  
Greed burst into a fit of malicious-sounding laughter that echoed in the alley. “Then you, of all angels, should be  _begging_  me to kill him. Not that I give a shit about these fucking meat-suits myself, but if you really know what this kid is, then you also know that they’re better off without him.”  
  
It was another plain and simple truth, brutal though it was. Maes knew that, as well.  
  
Just as he knew that his own reasons for wanting to spare Ed’s life had nothing at all to do with preserving humanity. To some degree, it had nothing to do with Ed, either.  
  
“Let him go, Greed. The others are coming. There’s no way you can handle one of us, let alone six.”  
  
“You might be right.” The demon smirked knowingly. “So that’s why I’m leveling the playing field...”  
  
*****  
  
The sound of loud, persistent knocking jolted Al out of his riveting game of solitaire. He glanced up from the cards spread over the coffee table and rolled his eyes. Leave it to Ed to forget his house keys.  
  
“Hold on, I’m coming!” he yelled when the knocking failed to cease.  
  
The teen got up and crossed the living room. He opened the front door, prepared to give his big brother all sorts of hell for being so careless.  
  
However, that was not Ed standing at the door.  
  
Had it been anyone other than a very pretty woman with short blond hair (save for the long lock up front) and a red tattoo that ran from her cheek down to her arm, Al might have been more cautious. But because she looked nothing like the strangers that parents always warned their children about—which was a smart move on Greed’s part for sending her instead of Loa—Al’s first reaction was also the one that did him in.  
  
“Um… hi,” he said with a tentative but ever so sweet smile. “Can I help you with something?”  
  
Martel smiled back. She couldn’t help it. The boy was awfully damn adorable.  
  
She really hoped that she would not have to hurt him.  
  
*****  
  
Roy arrived not even five minutes after Greed carelessly tossed Ed into the back of a nondescript van and made his escape with Loa behind the wheel. He had opted not to fly after all; aside from not caring to draw unwanted attention, he was extremely leery of Satan’s motives for returning him to his former glory. The Master of Hell did not give favor freely, and Roy did not want to find himself indebted to the bastard for his restoration until he could figure out why it was done. And what it was going to cost him.  
  
“Where are they?” he asked Maes, his eyes darting around the alley for any hints of Ed or Greed. Dread coursed through him when he realized there were none.  
  
“They’re gone,” Maes replied solemnly.  
  
“And you just  _let_  them go?”  
  
Roy approached his former lover, his fists clenched tightly. There was rage brewing just beyond his eyes, old rage and new rage,  _seething_  rage, and it hurt Maes right to his heart to see it.  
  
Especially knowing what he knew now. And how it was all going to end.  
  
“I didn’t have a choice,” he tried to explain, making sure to keep his voice even and calm. “There’s an old storage facility about ten miles away. Greed wants us to meet him there in three hours.”  
  
Maes had barely finished the last sentence before Roy turned to leave, and he reached out and grabbed him by the arm to stop him.  
  
_“Let go of me.”_  
  
Just as Roy snatched his arm away, Maes drew back as if scalded. The two angels stared at one another as Jean and the others finally arrived on the scene.  
  
“Roy…”  
  
Maes put an end to the rest of his sentence before it could fully form. Jean, Riza, Archer, and Kimblee had gathered around them now, and with no desire to announce the change that he sensed in Roy, the reclamation of abilities originally stripped for a very good reason, Maes resorted to telepathy in hopes of getting some answers.  
  
_What happened to you?  
  
It’s none of your business.  
  
Roy, please--  
  
Fuck off!_  
  
Maes recoiled visibly, and even Roy seemed caught off guard by the ferocity of his response to the concerned inquiry.  
  
“Maes, I have to go,” he said, his expression softening ever so slightly. “I have to find him.”  
  
Maes knew right then and there for certain that Edward Elric was not just some passing fancy or temporary dabble in the flesh. Roy was falling in love with him. And Father help anyone who harmed him.  
  
Even so, the game had changed.  
  
“No, you have to wait. Because this isn’t just about Ed anymore.”  
  
“What are you talking about?”  
  
With a heavy sigh, Maes took off his glasses. He had never needed them to begin with and now it was time to drop the charade for good.  
  
“Greed has his brother. And if we don’t do exactly what he wants, he’s going to kill him.”  
  
*****  
  
When Ed was fairly certain that he was not dead, he opened his eyes and willed them to focus. He was lying on a concrete floor, that was the only thing he knew for sure with regards to his surroundings. He also knew that his head was killing him. It was far worse than the night he woke up in Roy’s room.  
  
Ed sat up with a start at the thought of Roy's name, sending spikes of searing pain throughout his head and neck. His stomach rolled and he clenched his teeth, waiting out the nausea until he was sure that he was not going to vomit.  
  
After the worst had passed, he squinted around the room, trying to figure out where he was. As best he could tell from the slivers of waning daylight filtering in under what appeared to be a sheet door, he was being held in some sort of storage unit. If Greed had meant to kill him, then what the hell was he doing there?  
  
And where the hell was Roy?  
  
He felt a fierce and unexpected longing when he thought about the angel. Everything that Ed had ever believed his entire life was turned on its head, but at that moment, he just wanted to see Roy, to know that he was okay.  
  
Two very large booted feet walked past the unit door. So much for planning a great escape.  
  
Ed had no idea what he was supposed to do now. Therefore, he would do the only thing he that could. He would wait.  
  
A demon wanted him dead. Al was surely worried sick about him by now. Plus there was the whole  _getting jerked off by a heavenly being_  thing, too.  
  
What the hell else could possibly happen?  
  
He got his answer when he lifted his arms and lowered his face, meaning to seek refuge in the warmth and coolness of his palms.  
  
That was when he discovered that his right hand was missing.  
  
*****  
  
Since the store was so close, Maes felt that it was the only logical place to wait. He ushered everyone into his office with strict orders to his employees not to be disturbed, and now with one hour to go, he could feel the others stirring, growing restless. Ready for action.  
  
“This isn’t your fight,” Roy said to them yet again as he paced around the small room, made even more so by the number of bodies that inhabited it.  
  
“It became our fight when Greed called us out,” Jean reminded him.  
  
“And I think we can finally confirm that it was no coincidence,” Riza added quietly.  
  
The angels stared at each other, united in their silent agreement. Even if Greed did not know it, his actions had brought them all together. For the last time. Maes knew that now, and he was certain that the rest of them did as well. Even Roy, who had been so preoccupied with thoughts of his Ed that he hardly acknowledged the others, seemed to understand the stark reality and the inevitable  _finality_  of their situation.  
  
After this night, the Six would fall apart once again. This time for good.  
  
“I don’t know about you guys, but I could use a drink,” Maes announced as he pulled his trusty bottle from the bottom drawer. “I don’t have enough glasses to go around so we’ll just make Archer and Kimblee use them since we know where their mouths have been.”  
  
“Hey!” For as much as Archer pretended to be offended, he did not deny the implication. It would have been rather unconvincing anyway seeing as how his hand was presently resting between Kimblee’s legs.  
  
The room erupted into laughter. Even Roy cracked a smile, which pleased Maes greatly.  
  
Their eyes met across the room, and Maes was overcome with affection and sorrow. There were so many things he still wanted to say and not nearly enough time to say them, but he thought that maybe, in that shared look, Roy understood the gist of it all the same.  
  
Maes was so caught up in speculating that he did not notice when Jean slipped out of the room…  
  
*****  
  
… and made his way towards the back exit. He stepped outside, where he was treated with a most unflattering view of a dumpster and a fence, and he spotted Elysia sitting on the ground, drawing pictures with a large piece of yellow sidewalk chalk.  
  
“Hello again.”  
  
Elysia looked up and smiled at Jean in a way that gripped his heart. She patted the ground beside her and resumed her masterpiece.  
  
“I’ll just stand over here,” Jean said. “I’m going to smoke and I don’t want to do it around you.”  
  
The little girl smacked the ground again. Slowly this time, for emphasis.  
  
Well, he supposed he couldn’t argue with that. He took a seat beside her and crossed his legs so that they wouldn’t get in her way.  
  
“So what are you drawing?” he asked, peering down at… whatever that was supposed to be.  
  
Elysia shrugged. Apparently she had no idea, either.  
  
She raised two fingers to her lips in a smoking gesture, indicating that she was fine with Jean lighting up in front of her. Jean tucked a cigarette between his lips and ignited it, breathing in deeply.  
  
“Thank you,” he said, exhaling a gust of smoke.  
  
Elysia nodded, her pigtails flopping about. They sat in companionable silence, with Elysia continuing to sketch badly and Jean puffing away. By the time he was finished, he had a piece of chalk for himself and was using it to draw his own horrible pictures on the pavement.  
  
“Wow,” he muttered, looking down at what they had done. “We really suck.”  
  
The child’s chest hitched in a soundless chuckle and she nodded her agreement.  
  
“Who are you, Elysia?” Jean asked suddenly. He set down the chalk and clasped his hands, then favored her with a beseeching gaze. “Why do you feel like someone I should know?”  
  
Elysia’s face grew serious. She regarded the angel, contemplating an unspoken response.  
  
Eventually, she held out her hand.  
  
And Jean took it.  
  
*****  
  
“Why a grocery store, Maes?” Kimblee wanted to know. He took a sip from the glass that Maes had not been kidding about having him use. “Out of all the possibilities, you chose  _this_?”  
  
“What would you have chosen?” Maes asked. “A sex shop? A tattoo parlor? Some other place equally devoted to the desecration of the human body?”  
  
“Sex shop,” Archer and Kimblee announced in unison.  
  
“Of course,” Maes, Roy, and Riza replied.  
  
While the insatiable couple resumed doing everything short of having sex with their clothes on--  
  
“ _Seriously_ , you two,” Maes growled.  
  
\-- Roy took a seat next to Riza in the chair vacated by Jean.  
  
“Where did Havoc go?” he asked while Riza upended the bottle of booze and drank deeply.  
  
“Outside with Elysia.”  
  
Maes failed to include that Jean was now privy to a very special secret.  And something else, as well.  
  
“I’ll go check on them,” he added, rising to his feet.  
  
He excused himself to step out of the office, but not before threatening to douse Archer and Kimblee with a water hose to calm them down. Not that he was positive that would have even worked.  
  
Honestly, those two. Inappropriate though they were, and they were  _so very inappropriate_ , they were also two of the most fiercely loyal angels that Heaven had ever produced.  
  
Maes was going to miss them.  
  
*****  
  
Elysia released Jean’s hand, her small face wise well beyond its years.  
  
Jean gaped at the child, his mouth open but unable to form the proper words. Or any words at all, for that matter. But before he could figure it out, Elysia raised an index finger to her smiling lips. The meaning was crystal clear.  
  
“Now you know.” Maes joined them and crouched down next to the stupefied angel. “It's almost time,” he said to Elysia.  
  
The girl nodded and stood up. She grabbed the small black teddy bear that had kept her company for most of the day and bolted inside, leaving Maes and Jean alone.  
  
“She’s…” Jean shook his head and tried again. “She’s… our Father?”  
  
“A very small part of Him, yes. And the others can’t know until she chooses to reveal it, so close your mouth.”  
  
Jean did just that by lighting another cigarette with hands that were not exactly steady. “Why did she tell me?”  
  
“Because you asked.”  
  
“And why did she…”  
  
“Do that other thing?” Maes took Jean by the arm and helped himself to a drag. “Because of what I’m about to tell you...”  
  
*****  
  
Had Roy not been so distracted, he would have wondered why Maes and Jean had remained outside after Elysia returned.  
  
He would have contemplated what they might have been discussing that could not be shared with the group.  
  
He would have recognized the change in Jean, the very same change that Roy had just undergone himself.  
  
And he would have immediately understood why that change indicated that Greed would ultimately prove to be the least of his worries.  
  
Roy checked the time.  
  
Twenty minutes to go.  
  
*****  
  
Ten minutes and two cigarettes later, all Jean Havoc could think to say was:  
  
“Holy shit.”  
  
Maes grinned bitterly. “I think that about covers it.”  
  
“Maes…”  
  
“Yeah, I know.” Maes stood up with a grunt and offered his hand. “Come on. It’s time to go.”  
  
Jean crushed his cigarette out on the ground and allowed Maes to pull him up. The angels stood face to face, steeling themselves for the task ahead.  
  
“You’re sure about this?” Jean asked.  
  
“Have I ever been wrong before?” Maes countered.  
  
“No.” Jean ran his fingers through messy blond locks. “But just this once, I wouldn’t mind if you were.”  
  
“Me, too.” Maes’ smile was thoughtful. And just a little bit sad. “We had a good run, didn’t we?”  
  
“We did,” Jean said softly.  
  
He shook his head and cleared his throat, eager to change the subject before things got entirely too sentimental.  
  
“Okay, let’s go kick some ass.”  
  
Maes smiled and nodded once in affirmation.  
  
“I’m counting on you…. Uriel.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the original story I wrote, Gabriel owns a tattoo parlor. I couldn't resist throwing in a mention of it here.


	10. Dying Light

As Maes suspected, Roy didn’t bother waiting for him and the others when they arrived at the storage facility. Instead, he took off down the first corridor he saw, yelling for Ed as he ran. Maes knew that there was no point in trying to stop him so he directed the rest of the group to split up and search the vast property. He was aware that Greed wasn’t working alone but their inability to pinpoint the exact location of his demonic presence likely meant that any other demons assisting him had spread out to confuse and distract them. It briefly occurred to him that all hell might break loose should Roy locate Greed and act without thinking, but in his heart he felt that would not be the case. Not when the brothers’ lives were at stake.  
  
Jean and Riza went one way while Archer and Kimblee went the other. Maes tightened his grip on Elysia’s hand and moved forward, his eyes darting about for any signs of life, human or other. They made their way through the maze of units, slowly working their way towards the sound of Roy’s voice. He stopped when they reached an intersection, trying to determine which way to go. While he pondered, a sensation swept over him, dark and foreboding. Maes had just enough time to assume a protective stance in front of Elysia before Evil itself stepped out from the shadows and blocked their path.  
  
“Oh, Gabriel, my dear brother,” Satan said, his voice full of mock sympathy. “Don’t you ever get tired of being His little lapdog?”  
  
Maes glared at the foul being, the beast, the perpetrator of the original sin. “You sent Greed after that boy.”  
  
“Of course I did.”  
  
“Why would you do that? If anything happens to him, you’re back to square one.”  
  
“True,” Satan admitted. “But I just couldn’t help myself. I do so enjoy creating chaos. Pain. Misery. Suffering.  _Death._ ”  
  
“You’re an abomination,” Maes spat.  
  
Satan grinned in the face of the angel’s disgust. “Yes, I am. But it’s not my fault. I was created that way.” He took a step to the right and for the very first time outside of a dream regarded the child standing behind Maes. “Isn’t that right,  _Yahw—_ ”  
  
His voice was suddenly gone. He raised a hand to his throat as he tried to finish the word but only silence came forth. Hatred flashed in the eye that wasn’t concealed by a patch. At that, Maes smiled triumphantly.  
  
“Did you honestly think that she was just going to let that name fall from your filthy lips?” he asked. “You forfeited that privilege a long time ago. ‘Brother.’”  
  
Satan lowered his hand and cleared his throat. “It doesn’t matter,” he hissed. “She knows how this is going to end. And so do you.” It was his turn to smile now, and when he did, the earth trembled beneath them. “ _My_  will be done.”  
  
And in the blink of an eye, he vanished.  
  
* * * * *  
  
“What the hell was that?” Archer asked, staring at the ground.  
  
Kimblee shook his head. “Nothing good. Come on.”  
  
They continued walking down the row of storage units, checking each one for Greed or the human. A little way farther up they spotted a figure wrapped in a cloak.  
  
“What the hell is  _that_?” Archer asked once again.  
  
Kimblee squinted. He caught a hint of movement from what he thought were the being’s feet, but upon closer inspection, he realized that what he saw was actually a tail. “That would be Bido,” he concluded.  
  
“What’s a Bido?”  
  
“A demon with a fucked up sense of humor.” When Kimblee saw that Archer had no idea what he was talking about, he continued, “Do you remember the time we participated in that angel/demon orgy?”  
  
“Which one?” Archer asked.  
  
Kimblee chuckled. There had been quite a few of them. “I don’t remember,” he said dismissively. “One of them. Anyway, I think you were… busy… at the time, but one of the angels there told me about a demon named Bido who wanted to come to Earth as some sort of human-lizard hybrid type thing just to mess with the humans. Scare little kids, that kind of thing.” Kimblee nodded towards the figure. “That’s him.”  
  
“I see. So what do we do?”  
  
They could no longer hear Roy’s voice, that had, up until that point, served as a destination in the seemingly endless maze of units. Kimblee suspected that the angel had found Greed, or Ed, or both of them, and felt an overwhelming urge to get to where they were. Fast.  
  
“We keep going until we find Roy and the others. And we don’t let anything get in our way.”  
  
The couple pressed on, moving straight towards the misshapen demon and preparing to attack him if necessary. They were caught completely off guard when Bido attempted to gain the upper hand on them by somehow climbing up a wall, which was shocking enough… and once again when the booming sound of a gunshot filled the air.  
  
Archer smirked. “At least we know where Riza and Havoc are now.”  
  
* * * * *  
  
“Damn, Riza.” Jean rubbed at his right ear and stared at the very large demon with the very large hole in the back of his head. “A little warning next time, huh?”  
  
“You need to keep going,” Riza said, her Desert Eagle pointed at the demon who had introduced himself as Loa before getting shot in the face and crumbling to the ground in agony. “I’ll keep him busy.”  
  
“I’m not leaving you alone with him.”  
  
When she turned the gun on him, he changed his mind.  
  
“Fine, jeez.” Jean reluctantly moved past the demon and noticed with sickening fascination that the crater in his skull was already starting to mend. “Be careful, okay?” he added softly.  
  
Their eyes met briefly. In that glance, Jean finally understood what Riza had meant the other day when she agreed with him that premonition wasn’t his thing. She wasn’t in love with Roy at all. She was in love with—  
  
“Go!” she yelled.  
  
Jean pushed the revelation from his mind. There was no time to dwell on it now. He only hoped that there would be time to do so later.  
  
* * * * *  
  
In all of his years, Roy had never felt more helpless than he did right now.  
  
“Let him go, Greed,” he said, his eyes fixed on the demon in front of him. He took great care not to look at Ed’s terrified face. If he did, he knew that he would break. “He’s not the one you want.”  
  
Greed’s smile was cold and vicious. He tightened his hold around Ed’s neck, delighting in the tortured moan that followed. “Look at big, bad Lucifer, reduced to a whiny bitch. Over a  _human_.” With his free hand, he reached inside his vest and produced an automail hand. “There you go,” he said, tossing it at Roy. “A souvenir.”  
  
Roy looked down at the hand on the ground, the same hand that had touched him so tenderly the night before. Ice cold rage threatened to envelop him. Another gunshot rang out, but like the other, he paid it no mind. “Let him go,” he said again, his voice low, ominous. “Do it now, while you still have a chance to walk away from this.”  
  
“I have every intention of walking away from this,” the demon countered. “I’m the only one here who knows where his brother is. If anything happens to me, he’s as good as dead.”  
  
Upon hearing that his brother was in danger, Ed started struggling against Greed’s grip.  _“What did you do to my brother?”_  
  
“Nothing. Yet.”  
  
“If you hurt him, I’ll—”  
  
Ed stopped abruptly when the sharp blade of a knife pressed against his cheek.  
  
“You’ll what?” Greed asked. “Stupid fucking monkey. What exactly will you do?”  
  
Roy’s heart and stomach lurched at the sight of the knife. He had to do something, and do it quickly. For all he knew, Greed had been bluffing when he told Maes about Alphonse. But even if he wasn’t, there was nothing Roy could do about it until he got Ed to safety.  
  
“Do whatever you want to me,” he offered, risking a step forward. “I won’t retaliate and I won’t try to stop you. I killed Dorochet so I owe you that. Just  _let him go_.”  
  
“You know, I always thought you got a raw deal,” Greed said. “The Father was a dick for casting you out of Heaven and Satan was a dick for casting you out of Hell when you started stealing his thunder. I just wanted you to know that I feel for you because that’s some pretty messed up shit.” He paused for a moment, contemplating. “But that doesn’t change the fact that you killed my friend. So as tempting as your offer sounds, I’m afraid I’m going to have to decline. For what it’s worth, I’ve decided to make it quick. Out of respect.”  
  
By the time Roy reached them, it was already too late. A gush of blood splashed over his face and chest as Ed collapsed against him, clawing at his slashed throat. Roy’s bones turned to liquid and he sank to the ground with the dying young man in his arms. He was unaware of his screams and the sudden, sharp rise in temperature that was his own subconscious doing.  
  
“No,” he rasped when he could scream no longer. “No, no, no, no.”  
  
The light in Ed’s eyes was fading. With his abilities restored, Roy could feel Ed’s spirit detaching from its Earthly vessel. He swept him into a crushing embrace as if doing so would keep it from departing. But it didn’t. Moments later, the light was extinguished for good. Edward Elric was dead.  
  
Roy heard the gasps and exclamations of his fellow angels as they came upon the bloody scene. Someone was calling out to him, Jean or Maes perhaps, but he didn’t care. Ed was gone. And even though what he now held in his arms was nothing more than an empty shell, he gently kissed the forehead, his eyes shut tightly against the insurmountable ache in his heart. He carefully lowered Ed’s body to the ground and rose to his feet.  
  
“ _Now_  we’re even,” Greed said, wiping the blade on his pants. “Once we’re out of here, I’ll release the brother.” He signaled to Bido and Loa, who had done their jobs by keeping the others distracted long enough for Greed to take his revenge. Loa was cradling the back of his healing head. Two bullets to the dome had not treated him kindly. “Let’s go.”  
  
They got as far as the end of the row before being met with a wall of searing fire.  
  
“You do this and that boy is dead,” Greed warned Roy. “And I promise you, he won’t go pretty.”  
  
An eerie calm came over Roy as he approached the trio. He looked to Greed, noting the eyes like slits and shark-like sneer. Then he thought about Ed. A young man who had only begun to live. Shy yet sweet, broken in body yet resilient in spirit. Now that spirit was gone.  
  
“Look on the bright side,” Greed added. “At least what’s his name over there, Ed, will be waiting for you when you finally get to Heaven.  _If_  they let you back in, that is.”  
  
He had barely finished the sentence when Loa and Bido were consumed by flames. It happened so fast that they didn’t even have a chance to scream.  
  
“Shit!”

Greed stepped away from the carnage, his cocky attitude now gone. The knife he had used to cut Ed’s throat fell to the ground, forgotten and useless. He was trapped between the wall of fire and Roy, and there was nowhere for him to go. When he saw the look on Roy’s face and realized that repeating his threat would not save him, that Roy was too far gone to give a damn about what happened to Ed’s brother, he grinned bitterly and accepted his fate.

“Go on then. I’ll just come back again. I think I’ll go with a different body next time around. Younger. With long hair.”  
  
Unlike the others, Roy made sure to burn Greed slowly, from the inside out. The demon did his best to contain any outward expression of torment but in the end, the pain was too much. Greed screamed. Oh, how he screamed.  
  
With that finished, Roy returned to Ed’s body and knelt beside it. Those lifeless eyes were an affront to the golden warmth he had grown to adore, and he forced the lids down, his fingers lovingly tracing along the skin that was already growing cold. He sensed the others gathering around him, felt their sadness and their pity. The feeling was particularly strong from the one from whom he least expected, and he raised his head and found Elysia watching him sorrowfully.  
  
And just like that, either through his own sudden understanding or the will of Another, Roy knew. He tilted his head, a questioning gesture to which Elysia nodded slightly in response.  
  
Unbelievable. This pig-tailed little girl with the big green eyes and a fluffy black teddy bear… this was his Father.  
  
Roy had often wondered how this moment would go, all the things he would say or do when looking upon His face after so much time had passed. He had imagined that he would cling to his pride and defend his actions, standing up to the One who made him, even at the risk of eternal damnation. But the reality was far different from any of the scenarios he had envisioned over the years. Roy’s rebellion, his subsequent rejection, his pride… none of those things mattered to him right now. Not at all.  
  
“Bring him back,” he pleaded. “This is all my fault. He didn’t deserve to die for what I did. So bring him back.  _Please._ ”  
  
Maes and Jean looked on in astonishment. Riza, Archer, and Kimblee, who were standing out of earshot and still none the wiser about Elysia’s true identity, watched as well.  
  
Elysia reached over Ed’s body and stroked Roy’s cheek with her tiny hand, her face full of grief and compassion… then she took a step backwards, making her answer clear.  
  
And with that denial, the dam within Roy burst, and eons of fury poured through him.  
  
He stood up, every inch of his body trembling. “I hate you,” he whispered, letting his anger overtake him.  _“I hate you.”_  
  
“That’s enough, Roy,” Maes said.  
  
“No, it isn’t. It isn’t nearly enough.” Roy turned away from Maes’ concerned gaze and glared at the small incarnation of his Father. “Bring him back. I don’t care what you do to me, just give him a chance to live.”  
  
Elysia took another step back. It was the final straw.  
  
A pair of grand and fiery wings shot out from Roy’s back, arcing high above him in all their ethereal glory. His eyes grew jet black. His skin split open and bled in various places under the strain of containing the enormity of his power. Within the palm of a hand that was bathed in flames, Roy’s sword materialized. The flames spread down the length of the blade until it was covered completely.  
  
“This won’t be as good as killing the  _real_  You,” he said, pointing the sword at Elysia. “But it’ll have to do.”  
  
He stepped towards the child, his sword poised and ready to strike… until Jean Havoc blocked his advance, wielding a sword much like his own.  
  
Roy’s eyes narrowed in recognition. “Get out of my way, Uriel.”  
  
“I can’t do that,” Jean told him, shaking his head. “You’re going to have to kill me.”  
  
“You think I won’t?”  
  
“I don’t know. If it’s all the same to you, I’d rather not find out.”  
  
“Then move.”  
  
_“Stop it, Roy,”_  Jean begged him. “I know you’re hurting but killing her is only going to make things worse for you. Please, lay down your sword.”  
  
The angel’s compassionate plea had no effect. Whatever small measure of goodness that Roy Mustang possessed was now blotted out entirely by Lucifer’s rage.  
  
Thunder rumbled overhead, and an immense heat filled the atmosphere. A single droplet of fire fell from the sky and hit the ground. Then another. And another.  
  
The storm that Elysia predicted had arrived.  
  
Roy’s smile was pure and unrestrained madness. The Father had taken someone away from him, someone he treasured dearly. Now he was going to return the favor.  
  
_Billions_  of times over.  
  
But there was something else he needed to do first.  
  
“Lay down my sword? I have a better idea.  _Raise yours._ ”


	11. Divine Will

As Roy and Jean fought amongst the fire that rained down from the heavens, Maes and the others sought refuge in an empty storage unit. From there, all they could do was watch helplessly as their brothers tried to best each other while the world burned around them.  
  
“We have to do something,” Riza said, her usually cool demeanor replaced with uncharacteristic desperation. “We can’t just stand here while they kill each other.”  
  
“There’s nothing we can do,” Archer responded softly. “If you go out there, Roy…  _Lucifier_ … he’ll kill you, too.”  
  
“I don’t care!”  
  
“I’m sure that Jean does,” Kimblee told her. “Trying to come between them now is only going to distract him.”  
  
As the trio continued to argue, Maes slumped down to the ground beside Ed’s body. He had carried it to safety himself because it wasn’t right to leave it out in the open to burn. Whatever was left of Roy wouldn’t have wanted that to happen. But that wasn’t the only reason…  
  
Before he could reflect further on that, Elysia approached and sat down beside him. She set her teddy bear aside and took his hand, squeezing it with a strength that belied her tiny size.  
  
Maes turned to look at the miniature embodiment of his Maker, his heart swelling with love and sadness and regret. The time had come for him to do the thing that, deep down and from the very beginning, he had always known he was going to do.  
  
“You know what I’m about to do,” he began, keeping his voice low so that the others couldn’t hear him. “You’ve  _always_  known.”  
  
Elysia nodded, her wide green eyes filled with understanding.  
  
“I know it’s all according to your will, but I still need to know that you forgive me.”  
  
The little girl sat up on her knees and hugged him hard, cradling his head against her own. Maes returned the embrace with equal fervor, his eyes squeezing shut against the threat of tears as the warmth of his Father’s love washed over him and gave him peace.  
  
“Thank you,” he whispered shakily.  
  
After they parted, he gazed at his fellow Fallen, who were still bickering amongst themselves about the futility of Riza’s desire to run out and confront the dueling angels with guns a-blazing.  
  
“Hey, guys.” When none of them heard him speak, he tried again, louder this time.  _“Hey.”_  
  
With their attention finally captured, Maes sighed and rose to his feet. He spared one last glance at Ed—  
  
_You better be worth it, kid._  
  
—and walked over to them with Elysia trailing behind him.  
  
“What is it?” Archer asked.  
  
“Tell me you have some brilliant plan to deal with this,” Kimblee wanted to know.  
  
“Brilliant is hardly the word I would use.” Maes raised a hand to his face and grinned bitterly when he remembered that he was no longer wearing any glasses to push up. Apparently human habits were hard to break. “I need all of you to do something for me,” he continued, his expression growing somber.  
  
“What?” Riza asked.  
  
“I need you to stay here.”  
  
_“What?”_  
  
Maes knew that among the three of them, Riza was the one most likely to refuse his request. All he could hope for at this point was that Kimblee’s warning about Jean would keep her from interfering.  
  
“Stay here,” he repeated, looking each of them pointedly in the eyes. “Whatever happens. Whatever you see.”  
  
“Maes…” Kimblee began, sensing something was wrong.  
  
Maes held up his hand to silence the protest. “Just…  _please_. Do this for me.”  
  
“You know something,” Riza said.  
  
“Of course I do. Premonition  _is_  my thing.”  
  
“All right, we’ll wait,” Archer replied hesitantly, answering for all of them. “But for how long?”  
  
As the air filled with the faraway sound of sirens that signaled the summoning of help in a world suddenly gone mad, Maes smiled sadly at his kindred, his fellow angels with whom he had taken on Heaven and Hell.  
  
“Until it’s over.”  
  
* * * * *  
  
Jean wasn’t sure how much longer he would last. Although his human vessel was full of angelic power,  _swollen_  with it, he was still having a hard time battling Roy into submission. It wasn’t his intent to kill him, assuming that he even could, but he could feel the tide shifting in favor of the being hell-bent on destroying the world and everything in it.  
  
He lifted his sword just in time to block a vicious strike, grunting against the force of the blow and the burning sting of firedrops. Roy’s face was a contortion of rage and heartache and murder and sorrow that ripped at Jean’s heart. Lucifer had suffered every atrocity an angel could, and in some ways Jean could understand and even sympathize with his meltdown. But enough innocent blood had been spilled this day, and he could not—he  _would not_ —sit back and do nothing while others perished as well.  
  
Considering everything yet to come, Jean was fully aware that there might be a day when the world succumbed to flames. But not today. Not if he had anything to do with it.  
  
“Roy,  _please_ ,” he pleaded over the howl of emergency vehicles and ever growing turmoil of the city around them. “Don’t do this. These humans have done nothing to deserve this.”  
  
Roy struck at him again and again and again, each attempt punctuated by a growl of fury. “Neither did Ed,” he said as he raised his sword high in the air. “But do you think  _He_  cared about that? You saw for yourself that He didn’t.”  
  
Jean yelped as Roy’s flaming sword caught him off guard and swept across his upper right arm, slicing through cotton and skin and muscle right down to the bone. Somewhere nearby, Riza was screaming. His entire arm exploded in pain, and the weight of his own sword was suddenly too much to bear. Worldly injuries were one thing, and he and the others were perfectly capable of healing from them almost instantly. But a cut from an angelic weapon was different and, for those like him, potentially fatal.  
  
“Yes, I saw,” he replied, his breathing quick and harsh. Blood poured through the fingers that were pressed firmly against his wound. “And I wish…” Jean slowly shook his head. He stared past the tip of the sword pointed at his face and directly into the eyes of his former lover. “It doesn’t matter what I wish. If it was the Father’s will for Ed to die, then there was nothing that any of us, not even you, could have done to stop it from happening.”  
  
Jet black eyes narrowed. “ _Fuck His will_.”  
  
“ _Roy!_ ”  
  
Both Roy and Jean turned to the sound of the voice that called out and found Maes coming toward them. He positioned himself between the two angels, the sword that was pointed at Jean’s face now dangerously close to his throat.  
  
Jean grabbed Maes’ shoulder with bloody fingers. “What the hell are you doing? I’m not down for the count yet.”  
  
Maes turned to look at him. “I know, but I don’t think Riza would ever forgive me if something worse happened to you.” He smiled sweetly at Jean. “You did what you could. Thank you.”  
  
“This doesn’t concern you, Maes,” Roy said in a low, ominous voice. “Get out of my way.”  
  
Turning back around, Maes’ smile faded. “Stop this now, Roy. While you still can. Before… Before it’s too late.”  
  
While Maes spoke, Jean was dimly aware that the fire had stopped falling in their immediate vicinity, and he wondered if Roy was even consciously aware of what he had done. Even now, in the depths of his anger and after all the years of his supposed hatred, he would never do anything to hurt Maes. Knowing this, it made the unfortunate decision that Jean had made earlier that much easier to accept.  
  
Roy scoffed at the angel’s words. “It’s  _already_  too late.”  
  
Maes closed his eyes, shutting out Roy’s dark gaze. “Then go ahead and do what you feel you need to do.”  
  
“I will.”  
  
Jean would relive what happened next time and time again for the duration of his imprisonment on the mortal plane. He reached out to shove Maes out of the way, having every intention of taking his place in the path of Roy’s swing. When Maes had revealed to him back at the store what Roy was going to do, he decided right then and there to sacrifice himself instead. While he wasn’t in a hurry to die in such a way, he still cared enough about Roy to put himself at the mercy of his blade so that Roy would never know the guilt of using it against the one he once, and in all likelihood  _still_  loved. At least to some degree. Whether or not he ever chose to admit it.  
  
As his hand was about to close down on Maes, he was gone. So was Roy. Jean stumbled forward from the momentum, and after he righted himself, he looked up and saw what was about to happen. And by the time he saw it, it was already too late to do anything about it.  
  
Roy flew toward Elysia, who had been standing at a distance and watching them the entire time. The wind from his fiery wings was immense, and Jean was almost knocked over by the force of it. He screamed at Roy to stop and raced after him, praying that his own power would get him there soon enough. But he had only halfway closed the distance as Roy swung his sword with a thunderous roar of vengeance and slashed at his target.  
  
… Or what he  _thought_  was his target.  
  
Screams issued from the storage unit. Jean barely heard them over Roy’s. Or his own.  
  
Despite his best efforts, Maes’ prophecy had come true, after all.  
  
* * * * *  
  
At some point he could not recall, Roy finally stopped screaming. His sword fell from numb fingers and dematerialized before it could hit the ground. His wings disappeared and his eyes returned to normal and the rain of fire that had ravaged an entire planet in such a short period of time came to an end. He dropped down to the ground and rolled Maes over, ignoring the blood-spattered little girl who watched him with infinite sadness. The angel’s hands covered his torso, which was the only thing that was keeping everything inside of him from spilling out.  
  
Roy pulled him into his arms, as if doing so could undo the horrible thing he had just done. Maes’ beard grazed his cheek and Roy’s heart sank as he realized that this was going to be the last time he ever felt it.  
  
“Damn it, Maes,” he whispered harshly. “Why did you do that?”  
  
Maes opened his mouth and a grotesque amount of blood sprayed from his lips. After a minute of hacking and sputtering he tried again. “This was always going to happen… I knew that… Hoped not… But I knew.”  
  
Roy glared at Elysia with tears in his eyes. “Because it was  _His_ will?”  
  
Maes cupped Roy’s cheek with a blood-covered hand, forcing him to meet his pain-filled eyes. “And mine… Now I can go Home.” His body lurched in Roy’s arms and his face twisted in agony. “That’s what I’ve always wanted… So don’t blame Him… Or yourself.”  
  
“Oh, Gabriel.” Roy was unable to stop the tears from falling. “I’m so sorry. For everything.”  
  
He touched his forehead to Maes’ and wept openly, not just for what he had done now, but for all of it—the rebellion in Heaven and subsequent rejection, the torture of Hell, the years upon years upon years in mortal captivity. His rage had given way to his sadness, and it consumed him completely, blanketing him like a shroud. Eons of remorse over the loss of their Father’s approval and the near destruction and eventual expulsion from Home came out in a sickening and seemingly endless stream of profanities and tears. Roy, no,  _Lucifer_  had subjected not just himself but the ones he cherished most to this fate. He had led them all astray because of his own arrogance and pride, and because he’d had the audacity to challenge the Father. And now, because of that, Maes was going to die by the hands of the very angel he loved.  
  
Roy leaned into the fingers that stroked his tear-stained cheek. Half of his face was now smeared with blood, but he didn’t care. Jean and the others were fanned around them, but he didn’t care about that, either. And Elysia, that tiny little sliver of his Father, was still there, too. Roy cared about that least of all.  
  
Maes tilted his chin so that their eyes could meet. His lips quivered as he tried to speak again, but it took too much effort and he didn’t have the time. So instead, he reverted to their old way of communicating.  
  
_Stop apologizing. I chose you. We all did._  
  
His hand fell limp to his side. His chest hitched once, twice, three times. Then it rose no more.  
  
But then… there was light. A brilliant and blinding light that illuminated the entire area. Roy raised his head and peered into the center of it, seeking out the vaguely humanoid form of the angel from whom it emanated. Tendrils of light reached out to him and took him by the arm, guiding him to his feet. Roy blinked as droplets of water pelted him in the face, one by one until they became a steady downpour that gradually vanquished the destruction he had caused.  
  
The angel who was once a man named Maes Hughes looked upon the awe-struck faces of the others. Jean, Riza, Archer, and Kimblee. Uriel, Hesediel, Kushiel, and Adriel. Then his attention returned to Roy.  
  
_Take care of him._  
  
Roy blinked rainwater out of his eyes. “What do you mean?”  
  
He received his answer in the form of an eerie glow that poured out of the storage unit.  
  
“What are you doing?”  
  
Gabriel smiled at him.  _Choosing you. Again. Goodbye, Lucifer._  
  
And then he was gone.  
  
Roy didn’t know how long he remained there, frozen in place and staring into space. He was yanked back into awareness by the growing commotion taking place behind him, whatever it was, but the only thing he could see at the moment was a very small, very sad little girl.  
  
“He’s all yours again,” he said over the growing storm. There was little to no fight in his words; he was too emotionally spent to put much effort into reclaiming his anger. “You win. You  _always_  win.”  
  
Elysia sighed deeply, making it obvious that she took no joy whatsoever in that fact.  
  
Roy heard his name being called—being  _screamed_ , rather. He spun around and saw Jean and the others gathered at the unit entrance, along with two other people who weren’t there before. Roy recognized one of them right away as Ed’s little brother, Alphonse. The other was a demon in the form of a young woman. One of Greed’s crew. The fact that she had brought the boy to the facility demonstrated that she was not a threat; if she had been, the others would have dealt with her immediately.  
  
And there, emerging from the unit to Roy’s absolute shock and disbelief, was Ed. He was very much alive and, with the exception of his missing automail hand, no worse for wear. Maes’ words suddenly made all the sense in the world.  
  
The enormity of what the angel had done for him caused Roy to ache with equal amounts of love and grief. He turned back to face Elysia, fully intending to question her about his decision… but now she was gone, too.  
  
No matter. Things would probably never be right between them again, but right now that didn’t matter at all.  
  
He ran over to the unit and pushed everyone out of the way to reach Ed. The young man barely had time to open his mouth to speak before Roy swept him into a suffocating embrace, his battered heart now overjoyed at the sensation of heat from Ed’s miraculously living, breathing body.  
  
“Roy?” Ed muttered into his chest.  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
Ed pulled back and stared at him with golden eyes that were blessedly full of life.  
  
“I just had the weirdest fucking dream.”  
  
  
* * * * *  
  
“He didn’t remember anything?” Jean asked two days later as he lit a cigarette and settled back on the bed in Roy’s room. “Nothing at all?”  
  
Roy shoved a pair of pants into the overnight bag he had hastily packed. “Bits and pieces,” he replied. “He remembered Dorochet and the night we met, but he barely remembered Greed at all. I had to fill him in on a lot of it.”  
  
“How’d he take it?”  
  
“About as well as anyone would after they find out they were dead.”  
  
Jean nodded and dragged hard on his cigarette. He rubbed at his arm that was still on the mend from Roy’s assault.  
  
“Jean…”  
  
“Roy, if you apologize to me again, I swear I’m going to punch you in the face.”  
  
Roy held up his hands in a show of defeat. “I really am sorry, though.”  
  
“I know. So drop it.” Jean stretched out his legs and puffed away. “What about Ed’s brother?”  
  
“Ed decided that it would be better if Al didn’t know anything.”  
  
“That’s going to be kind of hard for you to pull off in a decade or two. Unless he happens to go blind, he’s going to notice that you’re not aging.”  
  
“I know,” Roy said. “But that’s what Ed wants for now.” He zipped the bag and dropped it to the floor, then sat down beside Jean and helped himself to a hit off his cigarette. “Is Riza at the store?”  
  
“Yeah. I’m not ready to deal with all of that yet.”  
  
Both the grocery store and home that Maes had owned were now and, according to the necessary documentation, had always been property of one Jean Havoc. Strangely enough, no one seemed to remember anything at all about a handsome green-eyed bachelor and his adorable mute child. All traces of their human existence had been utterly and completely erased.  
  
“Is she sticking around?” Roy asked.  
  
“I don’t know. Maybe.”  
  
Their eyes met. Eventually, Roy started laughing.  
  
“I can’t believe you didn’t know how she felt about you.”  
  
“Shut up,” Jean mumbled as he tapped ash into an empty beer bottle. “I’m trying to make it up to her.”  
  
Roy’s expression grew thoughtful. “Good. I hope it works out for you.”  
  
“Did I tell you that Kimblee and Archer made a bet to see if I would fuck it up?”  
  
“That doesn’t surprise me at all.”  
  
“Assholes.”  
  
“I miss those assholes.”  
  
“Yeah, me too. But you know them. Places to go, people to fuck.” Jean finished his cigarette and produced two more. After handing one to Roy, he held his out at arm’s length. “Care to do the honors?”  
  
“I think my days of parlor tricks are over,” Roy replied as he reached out to the nightstand for the lighter that was next to yesterday’s newspaper. Images of fires from around the world plastered the front page, along with the headline, _Worldwide Terrorist Attack or End of Times?!_  
  
“I don’t know.” Jean took the offered lighter and lit up, then extended the flame to Roy. “You may need those tricks again one day.”  
  
Roy tilted his head and stared at Jean through a wall of smoke. “Did Maes tell you something I should know?”  
  
“What do you think you know?” Jean countered.  
  
“Only what Satan told me. He said that Ed’s survival was important to him, that because of Ed, his plans would come to fruition.”  
  
“Did he tell you what those plans are?”  
  
“No, but I just assumed it was the usual evil and chaos and general disruption and perversion of everything the Father holds dear.” Roy glanced at Jean. “What?” he asked. “What didn’t he tell me?”  
  
Jean sighed a stream of smoke. “Humans will never know just how connected they are. How one little thing over here affects something way the hell over there. Some of them think they know, but they really have no idea how far their influence reaches. A man says hello to a woman on one side of the world and because of that a baby’s life is saved on the other side. Every single action, every single thing they do has bearing on something else. Something greater.”  
  
“What does this have to do with Ed?”  
  
“A boy loves his brother, more than anything in the world. That brother is all he has. That brother means so much to him that his death causes the boy to fall into an endless pit of depression. He never recovers from it. He grows up. He grows old. And he dies. Alone. End of story.” Jean dragged again, contemplating. “Or that brother lives,” he continued after a while. “The boy is happy and healthy and life is perfect—or as perfect as can be when all they’ve got is each other. He grows up. He meets a girl. He falls in love. He gets married.”  
  
A cold, sinking feeling settled in Roy’s stomach as Jean spoke. He had an idea where Jean was headed with his speech. An extremely bad idea.  
  
“They have children,” Jean went on. “Those children grow up and have children, their children have children, so on and so on, down the line, generation after generation. Until one day, a child is born. And that child…”  
  
“No,” Roy whispered, shaking his head.  
  
“Yes. That child grows up, becomes a man of great power and influence… and destroys the world. All because Ed lived.”  
  
“Jesus.”  
  
“Wrong son.”  
  
Roy felt sick all over. He ran his hand over his face, trying to take it all in. “The Antichrist.”  
  
Jean nodded. “That’s the one.”  
  
Roy put out his cigarette and stood up. He paced around the room, frowning. “Maes knew this.  _All_  of this.”  
  
“He did.”  
  
“Then why would he do it?” Roy stopped walking and stared at Jean in disbelief. “Why would he bring Ed back if he knew that his death would save the world?”  
  
“Because your heart was broken,” Jean replied quietly. “He brought Ed back for you, Roy. He damned the entire human race… for  _you_.”


	12. And They Lived Happily... For Now

Roy took his time walking to Ed’s house. While he very much looked forward to spending a few days with the young man now that things were back to normal—or as normal as could be for an immortal being trapped in a mortal world and destined to witness its destruction—he needed to process everything that Jean had told him. The price Maes had willingly paid to bring Ed back from the clutches of death and why he did it. He had a feeling that he would be processing the latter, especially, for quite some time.  
  
He moved along the sidewalk with his head down and eyes to the ground. The same hands that had caused so much chaos days ago were now clenched tightly around the straps of his overnight bag. Ed hadn’t specified how long he wanted Roy to stay, and Roy hadn’t asked. However, he wasn’t too worried about running out of things to wear. There was, he presumed, a washer and dryer at Ed’s house. And if not… well… it wasn’t as if he planned on being dressed the entire time that he was there.  
  
Eventually, he came upon Maes’…  _Jean’s_  store. Roy thought about popping in to say hello to Riza but he wasn’t entirely convinced that she had forgiven him yet for hurting Jean. The last thing he wanted to do was face her wrath or, by extension, her gun. So he kept on moving until he reached the alley where it all began. Or started to end, depending on how you looked at it. On a whim, he made a right turn and walked down the alley, eyes darting all around as images from that fateful night passed through his mind’s eye. Dorochet’s broken wrist… the fear and confusion in Ed’s face… and the fire.  
  
If Roy hadn’t interfered that night, then Dorochet would have killed Ed. Of course he was glad that didn’t happen, but it did make him wonder if his interference was a part of the plan. And if so, whose plan was it? Satan had nothing to gain and everything to lose from Ed’s death. Yet he was also exactly the type to spite himself if it meant sticking it to the One he hated most. What better way to do that than to set into motion a series of events that would cause one of God’s favorite angels to betray Him yet again? If that was his intention, then it was a resounding success.  
  
But presuming… no,  _knowing_  that the Father was well aware of what would transpire, Roy had to wonder why He had allowed things to play out the way they did. If the root of the Fallen’s confinement to Earth was that they had acted on their free will and chose to turn against Him in the first place, why would He knowingly condone Maes’ decision to put Roy’s happiness over the well-being of the world and the people He loved so much? While it was true that Maes’ actions one way or the other would have had no bearing on the ultimate outcome—the Antichrist would have been born regardless as it was foretold long ago—why would the Father allow him to agonize over whether to save Ed or the planet if it would only temporarily prolong the inevitable in both cases? Whatever the initial cause, the planet would still cease to exist one day as humans presently knew it. And despite Maes’ Deity-defying decision, Ed would still die. One day.  
  
But Roy didn’t want to think about that.  
  
The sudden and overwhelming presence of two demons spared him from the thoughts he had no desire to think. His head snapped up and he spun around, his bag dropping to the ground and his hands ready to dispense the same murderous punishment they had inflicted on one of the demons just days ago.  
  
“Hey, I’m not trying to start a fight,” the male demon said quickly, hands raised in surrender. “I learned my lesson the first time around. As far as I’m concerned, we’re even.  _Really_  even this time.”  
  
The image of Ed grasping at his slit throat raced through Roy’s mind and it was only by the greatest of efforts that he managed to refrain from bathing the entire alley in flames. He stood down, the fire and rage within him held at bay for the moment. After that, he studied the demon’s new human form. The body was a little younger and the hair was a lot longer, but he was still, without a doubt…  
  
“Greed.”  
  
“In the flesh,” Greed replied with a sinister leer. “Well,  _different_  flesh, thanks to you. But it’s still me. Although if anyone asks, I go by the name Ling now.”  
  
Roy was curious in spite of his initial urge to kill him again. “Why Ling?”  
  
“I figured a new body deserved a new name,” the demon replied with a shrug. “Martel... I mean Lan Fan and I—”  
  
“Lan Fan?” Roy stared at the demon that accompanied Greed. She looked nothing at all like the young woman who had brought Al to the storage facility but he could tell that they were one in the same.  
  
“—don’t want any trouble,” Greed continued. “You got your little boy toy back even after you burned me to a crisp so I think it’s safe to say that things worked out in your favor.”  
  
“How do you know about Ed?”  
  
“ _Everybody_  knows what Gabriel did. I don’t know how Heaven’s taking it, but Hell is rather impressed. We always love it when one of you goody-two-shoes disobeys the Big Guy, and Gabe’s the biggest one of all.”  
  
“Be careful how you speak about him,” Roy warned. “I haven’t decided not to kill you again yet.”  
  
Greed held up his hands again. “Like I said, we don’t want any trouble.”  
  
“Then why are you here?”  
  
The demon looked to his mate and then did something Roy never would have believed he was capable of doing. He smiled. An honest-to-goodness and—for as much as was possible for one like him—tender show of affection.  
  
“We have some... catching up to do.” Greed turned back to Roy, his smile vanishing. “I just wanted to say hello. And wish you luck. Something tells me you’re going to need it.”  
  
And with that, they took off, leaving Roy to stare after them in wonder. After a while, he picked up his bag and exited the alley. The general hustle and bustle started to dwindle the closer he moved toward the residential section of the street, and it wasn’t long before Roy felt the unmistakable sensation of being summoned. He glanced around, searching for the culprit (which he knew wasn’t Maes but couldn’t stop himself from hoping), and saw nothing of immediate interest in his line of sight. A few random pedestrians here and there, all heading for whatever destination awaited them and not paying him the slightest bit of attention, cars moving through an intersection, a bus stop bench where a young boy in a school uniform sat all by himself with a black teddy bear clutched in his hands—  
  
Roy’s heart jolted upon seeing him. With wide eyes, he stared at the child who, like Elysia, was not a child. The boy smiled faintly in return.  
  
Slowly, Roy approached the intersection. When he reached the bench, he sat down on the end opposite the tiny being, while all around them people and traffic and life went on without any concern spared for the unlikely duo.  
  
“Why do you pick children?” Roy asked.  
  
A small hand moved outward in a sweeping motion, gesturing at the scenery before them. The world around them. Even without the advantage of words, Roy understood. Out of the many possible human forms that the Father could take, it stood to reason that He would choose the most innocent of them all.  
  
Roy studied the boy. According to the  _Hello My Name Is_  sticker on his shirt, his name was Selim.  
  
Minutes passed. Two days ago, Roy had tried to kill Elysia. Now, his anger and hate were nowhere to be found. He’d made such a point of holding onto them that he didn’t know what to do without them. But instead of contemplating that too deeply, he decided instead to ask about the one thing that was far more important to him at the moment.  
  
“Is Maes... Is he happy?”  
  
Although Roy already had a good idea what the answer would be, he still felt a rush of relief when Selim nodded. The one thing that Maes had desired was to go Home. Roy felt that a piece of himself would always be missing given the angel’s Earthly demise, but it was enough to know that Maes had been welcomed back to Heaven with open arms just like he wanted.  
  
Selim scooted closer to Roy and touched his chest with a single digit, his eyes wide and questioning.  
  
“I suppose I am, all things considered,” he replied to the silent question about his own happiness. “And all things to come.”  
  
A frown passed briefly over the boy’s face. After it cleared, he shrugged in resignation.  
  
“Father...” Roy sighed while somewhere nearby a car horn blared. “It’s going to be bad, isn’t it?”  
  
He didn’t just mean the end of the world, though that was awful enough. He meant whatever his own role would be in that end. What he didn’t know, what he couldn’t have possibly known, was that his worst suspicions were nowhere close to the eventual actuality. He had no idea that the depth of his love for Ed would permanently tie him to the Elric family, or that when the infant destined to bring chaos and destruction to the planet looked at him for the first time with golden eyes much like those of his long-deceased descendant, he would be reminded of Ed and vow to protect the child at all costs, or that he would one day face off against the very angel who made it all possible in a final holy battle of good versus evil that would be felt throughout Earth, Heaven, and Hell.  
  
Selim nodded again, but he wasn’t divulging anything that Roy already (thought he) knew. And even if he had, it really didn’t matter. The pieces of the puzzle were going to fall into place in the manner they were intended. Even Roy’s affection for Ed, which he now believed came straight from his own heart and not as the result of any outside influence, was a part of the grand plan. There was no way around it. If the Father hadn’t even been willing to remove the burden of suffering from the Son, who had endured atrocities far worse than any human depiction imaginable, then Roy understood there was no point in asking that he be spared from whatever horror the future held. Besides, what right did he have to ask at all after everything he had done?  
  
A bus pulled up to the curb and Selim got up. He handed the bear to Roy and offered him one last sweet and tender and  _forgiving_  smile, and Roy’s teeth clenched in the realization that for all of his hate, he still loved his Father very much. As much as he didn’t want to. If only he could use some of the free will that had gotten him into this predicament in the first place to choose to deny the emotion.  
  
He watched as the child got on the bus. When the doors closed, he had a distinct feeling that it would be a long time before he saw his Maker again, at least to his knowledge. And perhaps, Roy thought, that was just as well.  
  
After waiting until the bus was out of sight, he got up and resumed walking. Within five minutes he was at Ed’s front door, whereupon all other worries and concerns were immediately dismissed in favor of anticipation. Even though barely twenty-four hours had passed since he last saw him, it felt like days. Roy wanted to spend as much time with Ed as possible, for however much time they had left.  
  
“Hey,” Ed said after opening the door. He glanced at the teddy bear in Roy’s hand, face scrunched in confusion. “What’s with the bear?”  
  
“It was a gift.”  
  
Roy could sense that the young man wanted to question him, and not just about the bear. But instead of doing so, Ed stood back and granted him entrance. There would be plenty of time to talk later. Something else was lurking in Ed’s eyes, just beneath the curiosity. Something that would not be so easily ignored for very long.  
  
“Al’s spending the night with a friend,” he explained while closing the door. “I told him he didn’t have to but he insisted.”  
  
“Smart boy,” Roy replied with a smirk.  
  
Ed grinned. “Yeah.”  
  
In the time it took for Roy to enter the living room and set his things down on the floor next to the sofa, Ed was right behind him, arms wrapped around him and holding him tightly. He found the move surprisingly bold and adorably possessive.  
  
Roy brought his arms down around Ed’s, his fingers grazing the cool metal of a recently reattached automail hand.  
  
“Impatient, aren’t we?”  
  
“A little bit.”  
  
Roy could feel the heat of Ed’s face against his back. He also felt the heat of something else a little farther down, and his body immediately responded. With more effort than he expected to put forth—who knew a human that size could be so strong?—he turned around in Ed’s arms, reciprocating with a hug of his own. As much as he wanted to get Ed naked, he was content for the moment exactly as they were, and he gave himself up to the embrace that satisfied a need that sex never could.  
  
After a few minutes, Ed finally pulled back, his cheeks pink with embarrassment. “So... did I mention that Al is gone?”  
  
With a hearty laugh, Roy replied, “You did.”  
  
“Just checking.”  
  
Roy pulled him into a long, drawn-out kiss. “Lead the way,” he purred after they parted, nuzzling against Ed’s cheek.  
  
Ed all but dragged him into his bedroom. The second he shut the door—Al wasn’t coming home but just in case—he pounced. They fumbled their way over to the bed, leaving a trail of hurriedly shed clothes along the way. Roy found himself being pushed onto his back, and he was shocked, amused, and  _incredibly aroused_  by Ed’s forcefulness.  
  
The young man straddled Roy’s hips, his crotch tantalizingly close to his erection. When he realized that Roy was waiting for him to continue, he asked, rather shyly, “What do you want me to do?”  
  
“Whatever you want.”  
  
“Can I fuck you?”  
  
The question inspired a series of mental images that Roy found extremely titillating. “If that’s what you want.”  
  
“That’s what I want. But not yet.” Ed traced a finger over Roy’s chest. “I probably wouldn’t last all that long right now,” he added under his breath.  
  
Roy felt no need to admit that the feeling was quite mutual. “So what do you want right now?” he inquired.  
  
At first, Roy thought that Ed was trying to come up with an answer. But upon closer inspection of the flushed face and averted eyes, he realized that Ed knew exactly what he wanted. He was just having a hard time getting it out.  
  
“... watch you,” Ed mumbled.  
  
“What?”  
  
“I said... I want to watch you.”  
  
“Watch me what?” Roy asked with a grin, knowing damn well what he was getting at.  
  
Ed’s face was full-on crimson now. “Touch yourself.”  
  
“Kinky.”  
  
“Shut up.”  
  
Roy chuckled. He was glad to see that being embarrassed had no effect on Ed’s attitude. “Come here.”  
  
Ed leaned down and Roy kissed him again. He cradled the young man’s cheeks in his hands, thumbs caressing smooth skin, and he pushed away a thought that would plague him for decades to come:  
  
_How much longer do we have?_  
  
“Scoot back,” he instructed.  
  
Ed slid back a bit, giving him room to work with. It wasn’t the first time that Roy had been asked to put on a show and he knew how to make it a good one. He ran his hands over his chest, pausing at his nipples long enough to pinch them which, judging by the moan that rose in Ed’s throat, was most appreciated. Then he moved lower, fingers splayed and nails scratching along his stomach, over the dark patch of hair that trailed down to his waiting cock. After taking a moment to wet his fingers, he took himself in hand and started to stroke. Slowly at first, then gradually increasing the pace. He kept his eyes trained on Ed, taking in the wide, watchful eyes and parted lips and heaving chest, and the left hand that slid between spread legs and was soon stroking in unison with Roy.  
  
“Do you like what you see?” Roy asked.  
  
An emphatic nod was the only reply Ed was capable of giving.  
  
When Roy saw that Ed’s motions were growing more urgent, he loosened the reins on his own self-control and began thrusting his hips, fucking up into his slick fist. After all, it wouldn’t be fair for the audience to finish before the show was over. He called forth one of the mental images prompted by Ed’s earlier query and pictured the young man balls deep inside of him, fucking him hard and fast.  
  
“Fuck,” he grunted, his entire body starting to tremble.  
  
“Roy,” Ed whispered shakily in warning, automail digits digging into Roy’s hip.  
  
But Roy was already too far gone. With one last thrust, he came all over his stomach and chest in hot, thick spurts. No sooner had he finished did Ed follow suit with a sharp cry. Despite being overcome by the force of his orgasm, Roy still had enough presence of mind to guide Ed—who was too spent to remain upright—down beside him so that he didn’t collapse right into the mess of their combined making.  
  
Roy turned to look at Ed, whose face was now red for different reasons, and felt a wave of affection so fierce that it hurt. He wrapped his arm around him and pulled him close. The warmth of Ed’s chest more than made up for the coolness of his automail.  
  
“I hope that was acceptable,” the angel commented smugly.  
  
“It’ll do for now.” Ed regarded him for a moment. Then he laughed.  
  
“What’s so funny?”  
  
“I didn’t even believe in God a week ago. Now I’m in bed with Lucifer.” Ed tucked an arm under his head, still smiling, blond hair spilling all around him. “Life is strange.”  
  
“Yes it is,” Roy agreed.  
  
“What happens now?”  
  
“Now I wipe the cum off me. Then we take a shower. Then you fuck me.”  
  
Ed playfully nudged him with a metal knee. “That’s not what I meant.”  
  
“I know.”  
  
The smile on Ed’s face faded. He sighed deeply, brow creased in a frown. “You’re not going to get any older. Physically, at least.”  
  
Roy sighed as well. The interrogation had begun. “No I’m not.”  
  
“... But I am.”  
  
Now it was Roy’s turn to laugh. Never before had he found the folly of humankind amusing but he did now.  
  
He reached over the edge of the bed and grabbed the first article of clothing he found, which just happened to be Ed’s shirt, and wiped off his torso as much as he could. After dropping it back to the floor, he rolled onto his side, head propped up on his elbow.  
  
“I wish you could see yourself the way I see you,” he began. “Sure, there’s the physical you, which is  _very nice_ , but that’s not who you are. That’s not what I love about you.”  
  
“So you’re still going to want me when I’m old and grey?”  
  
“Of course.” Roy touched Ed’s chest. “Your spirit will still be the same, even if the packaging changes over time.”  
  
He watched as Ed contemplated his words, trying to take it all in. Roy had to remind himself that humans were wired differently, that some of them had a hard time seeing past the packaging. He suspected that this would not be the last time he had to reassure Ed that age and outward appearance were not a threat to their union.  
  
“Anything else?” he asked.  
  
Ed snaked a hand beneath Roy’s arm and around his back until he found one of the twin scars that marked it. “What’s He like?”  
  
Roy thought about the Maker as He once was, or at least as Roy had perceived Him. Then he thought about Maes’ reentry into Heaven despite his last act of rebellion. Finally, he thought about the little boy sitting alone on a bus stop bench. Taking all of those viewpoints of the Father into consideration, he summed it up as best he could. “Stubborn and vengeful... merciful and forgiving... sad and lonely.”  
  
“He sounds complicated.”  
  
“He is... and He isn’t.”  
  
Ed went quiet while trying to reconcile a lifetime of what he thought he knew with what he was now being told. “I don’t know how the hell I’m going to explain this—and you—to Al,” he eventually managed. “It was hard enough bullshitting my way out of what happened the other day.”  
  
“You could always tell him that I have a great plastic surgeon,” Roy suggested.  
  
Snickering, Ed replied, “He’s naive, but he’s not  _that_  naive.”  
  
“Worth a shot.” Roy shrugged. “Just tell him whatever you think he needs to know.”  
  
Which was precisely what Roy intended to do where Ed was concerned. While he had no problem talking openly about the Father or Heaven or Hell, the one thing that Ed could never know was what the future held for the Elric bloodline. To let him in on that secret would make Maes’ sacrifice pointless, and that was something Roy refused to do.  
  
“That night in the alley...” Ed began, changing the subject. “The fire I saw... that was you?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“How?”  
  
In lieu of a verbal explanation, Roy lifted his arm, stretching it up toward the ceiling. He summoned the fire, finger by finger until his entire hand was covered in flames.  
  
Ed’s loud gasp was followed by an exclamation of, “Holy shit!”  
  
“Touch my hand.”  
  
“I would but your hand is  _on fire_.”  
  
Roy grinned at Ed’s understandable reaction. “I’m aware of that. Go on. Trust me.”  
  
Ed raised a tentative hand to Roy’s, cringing at the expectation of being burned. But he wasn’t. “How is this possible?” he asked as he linked their fingers together amidst the fire, fascinated.  
  
“It would only burn you if I wanted it to,” Roy explained.  
  
“Is that your way of saying I should never piss you off?”  
  
Roy snorted at that and extinguished the flames, then lowered their joined hands to his chest. “I highly doubt that I’ll ever be  _that_  pissed off at you. Besides, I’d much rather use my hand for something more enjoyable.”  
  
To prove his point, he let go of Ed’s hand and reached between his legs. Ed shuddered and hissed as Roy fondled him, and it didn’t take long until he was fully hard.  
  
“I’m going to take a shower,” he announced suddenly, letting go of Ed and crawling out of the bed.  
  
“Are you kidding me? After all of that?”  
  
“What?” Roy asked, blinking innocently at him. “I assumed you were joining me.”  
  
He grabbed Ed’s hand and pulled him out of the bed. They stood there, staring at each other, smiling and naked and happy. It was one of many moments that Roy would recall fondly hundreds of years down the road.  
  
Nothing could be done about the future. All Roy could do was focus on today. And tomorrow. And the day after that. The length of a human’s life barely qualified as a blink of the eye in the overall span of existence between what had been and what would be. Even so, Roy planned to make every single minute with Ed count until their time together on Earth came to an end.  
  
“Are you coming?” Ed asked as he walked into the bathroom.  
  
“That depends on you.”  
  
“Smartass.”  
  
With a smile on his face and a joy in his heart that he hadn’t felt in very long time—not to mention a rather hard cock—Roy dutifully followed Ed through the bathroom door and into the shower.


End file.
